


Chuck Versus the C G I (Chuck 6.03)

by anthropocene



Series: Chuck Season 6 [3]
Category: Chuck (TV)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Canon Compliant, Corporate Espionage, F/M, Romance, Science Fiction, Season/Series 06
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-22
Updated: 2013-01-22
Packaged: 2017-11-26 10:30:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 25,981
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/649596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anthropocene/pseuds/anthropocene
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sequel to "Chuck Versus What Happens in Vegas," and the third episode of an imaginary Season 6 of "Chuck." In this episode, Chuck and Sarah infiltrate a major Hollywood animation studio to investigate industrial espionage, lose some serious sleep at night, and (with the C.I. team's help) try to work out where to have their office and their home.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> There is a SOUNDTRACK for this episode (as in the actual series). Music cues are embedded in the text, and you can listen while you read! The soundtrack is available on 8tracks dot com; just search on the tag “anthropocene.” You can also find a direct link to the soundtrack on my author Bio page.
> 
> I appreciate hearing from my readers at any time...whether you liked the story or not, or have comments or questions. Even just a few words are always welcome. This is the only compensation a FF author ever gets. So please send me a comment via the box at the end of each chapter...and THANK YOU!
> 
> Disclaimer: As before, I don't own Chuck or any of its characters.

 

**(PROLOGUE)**

Chuck is strapped spread-eagled and face-down on a bed—a surprisingly soft, comfortable bed—but he's been totally immobilized. Fighting futilely against his bonds, he strains to lift his head just a little, trying to figure out where he is and what's happening to him. Dazzlingly bright lights are pointed straight at him. He squints and can just make out a single figure—a woman with long dark hair in a white coat—working at some kind of bench or desk a few feet away. The woman picks something up off the bench and holds it up to the light: it's a glass syringe with an enormous, pencil-thick needle! She turns and starts toward Chuck, holding the syringe out menacingly, her fingers already in position to give the injection. She draws closer and Chuck can see that there's some kind of miniature machine inside the syringe—a silver-grey robot, like an insect, with baleful tiny red eyes—exactly like something out of _The Matrix!_

" _N-no! Don't! Don't do it!"_ Chuck cries, as the raven-haired woman lifts the syringe high over his back, ready to plunge it down. He tugs harder at his restraints, to no avail.

Then suddenly, he's rolling over, and his body is enveloped in a calming, warm weight gently pressing down on him. Sweet-smelling long strands of hair brush lightly across his face, and he feels her breaths on him—it's _Sarah,_ it's his wife, his soulmate—but _why_ is she scratching at his chest so frantically?

" _I've got to get it out,"_ Sarah is saying. _"Got to save you—"_

"No, no, no…not _there_ baby," Chuck tries to tell her. "My _back_ …it's sticking in my back…."

And they both jolt awake at the same instant. They're in bed. Chuck is lying on his back and Sarah is on top of him, with her head raised and both of her hands clutching his chest. For a moment, they look straight at each other, surprised and bewildered—then both emit long, deep, troubled sighs—and Sarah flops limply down onto her husband.

* * *

**Four days earlier**

_(Music: "In My Place," by Coldplay)_

It's the usual sunny morning in the Southland. With Chuck beside her, Sarah threads her sexy black Lotus Evora through heavy traffic on the I-5 north past Griffith Park, headed from their apartment out to a business appointment in North Hollywood. Distracted by his thoughts, Chuck stares out the passenger-side window as the endless sprawl of metro Los Angeles rolls by. As they reach Burbank, Sarah turns west onto the Ventura Freeway, and Chuck nods to himself as if he's come to a decision about something.

"Babe?" he asks.

"Yeah?" replies Sarah, focused on the road.

"Would you mind if we turned off at the next exit? We're a little ahead of schedule and I'd like to make one quick stop."

He eyes Sarah attentively, wondering if she realizes what he has in mind—but she just smiles at him and says "Sure, sweetie."

They leave the freeway and enter a tree-shaded suburban community at the base of the Hollywood Hills. Sarah looks mystified as Chuck directs her away from the commercial district and into a quiet neighborhood of single-family homes. Not until they are about a block from Chuck's intended destination does she realize where he's brought them: back to her onetime dream house—the one with the red door, the flowers, and the neat white picket fence.

Sarah pulls the Lotus to the curb and leans back in her seat.

"It was dark the last time I was here," she says, quietly. "I'd forgotten how pretty it is…."

" _And_ still on the market," observes Chuck, pointing to the realtor's sign out front.

"Chuck…oh Chuck." Sarah turns to him as tears begin to appear in the corners of her eyes. "I wish you hadn't brought me here."

He runs his fingers through her hair. "But you once thought it was perfect. For us."

"I remember that," murmurs Sarah. "The candles, the wine…carving our names in the doorway…all of that—"

_(Flashback to Sarah smiling in the doorway and telling Chuck, "One day this will all be ours…And when it is, I would like to always remember this moment.")_

Her tears start flowing in earnest. "But I…I _also_ remember every horrible thing I said and did to you in there."

_(Flashbacks to Sarah sneering, "Our relationship was a cover, Bartowski, and always has been"…throwing Chuck into a mirror and kicking him down the stairs…to Chuck taking the blows and telling her "I'm never gonna fight you"…to Sarah coldly pointing her pistol at her own husband's head…to Chuck jumping in front of the bullet that Quinn meant for her…)_

" _You_ didn't do any of those things, baby—not really. Quinn is to blame."

"I wish I could see it the way you do," Sarah counters. "But I can't. Those two days of my life I'd give almost anything to take back—they're centered right here. I'm so sorry, but I just can't bear the thought of going inside again. Not now."

"I understand," Chuck replies, squeezing her hand and looking reassuringly into her sad eyes. "And I'm sorry too. Got to remind myself that we're taking things at _your_ pace. Not mine."

Sarah smiles back at him, tentatively. "I know you mean well," she adds, "and I love you for that."

"Love you too, babe."

Neither of them says anything more as they ride away from the house and complete the rest of their short trip to North Hollywood and their objective: a sprawling complex of strangely proportioned domed and cylindrical buildings faced in deep indigo-blue glass, connected by spidery elevated passageways and meandering sidewalks painted in all manner of bright colors not found in nature. Small knots of young professionals are scattered among the buildings: some of them walking, talking, and gesturing wildly; some of them lounging or sitting in clusters on the well-manicured lawns. One foursome is tossing an enormous beach ball around in a circle.

Out in front of everything is a great arched gateway with a sign that proudly proclaims FLIXILATED PICTURES. Here Sarah stops, lowers her window, and flashes her ID to the security guard on duty.

"Charles and Sarah Carmichael. We have an appointment."

The guard checks his monitor and nods. "Right on time. There's a VIP lot just inside the gate on the right and you can park there. They sent a tram for you—all yours 'cause the regular tours don't start for another two hours." He leans out of the guardhouse window and points ahead to indicate the way.

As the Lotus glides through the entrance, Chuck looks around with barely suppressed glee.

"When I was in college," he tells Sarah, "this was _way_ up on the list of places where I'd have killed to get a job."

"Really?" she asks. "Seems kind of lightweight for a badass engineer."

"No, not at all. With all the cool stuff they routinely do in here, FlixPix is as much a cutting-edge technology firm as it is a movie studio."

Sarah feigns disappointment. "Oh. So there'll be no schmoozing with the big stars then?"

"Not flesh and blood ones, at least."

After Sarah parks, and she and Chuck emerge from the Lotus—crisply dressed as usual, with matching reflective sunglasses and slender briefcases—they find that the security guard was referring to a tour tram that resembles a caricature of an Old West train, with a huffing-puffing locomotive and all. The tram is idling on the sidewalk just beyond the VIP lot and nobody is on board except the engineer: a cartoon man in baggy overalls with a huge head and tiny railroad cap. It's an animatronic figure, and it's gesturing directly at Chuck and Sarah to get on board the tram.

"They have _got_ to be kidding," says Sarah.

Chuck laughs out loud. "That's Rudy Toute!"

"And that makes it better?"

"He's a CGI character from FlixPix's first big hit— _The Daydream Train!_ Wow, babe…you and I would still have been in high school when that movie came out."

"I'll take your word for it," Sarah responds, shaking her head in disbelief. She and Chuck climb into the middle car of the empty three-car tram with briefcases in hand.

Rudy Toute's robotic arm pumps up and down, and a surprisingly realistic whistle emanates from the front of the mock locomotive—then the tram starts rolling smoothly forward into the main complex.

Sitting exposed in plain sight on a loud and flamboyant tourist ride, Sarah looks tense and uncomfortable at first. Then Chuck gives his wife a gentle shoulder-bump, and she rolls her eyes and laughs, giving in to the utter zaniness of their situation.

" _It's full steam to find your dream!"_ Rudy Toute announces, as the tram chugs down a lane leading directly to a massive, windowless sky-blue-colored building with one large door.

_(Opening credits and "Short Skirt, Long Jacket" theme by Cake)_


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own Chuck, and I cannot lie; fan fiction readers can't deny.

With Rudy Toute at the throttle, the tourist tram continues through the doorway into the big sky-blue building, which looks like a twenty-first-century remodel of an old blimp hangar. It's completely dark inside, and Sarah and Chuck tense for action—but the lights come on right away, and they see that they're in a cavernous but tidy space, with nothing in their immediate vicinity except a high-definition monitor with an IMAX-sized screen six stories tall.

The tram comes to a stop alongside the enormous monitor screen, which begins to display a mosaic of clips from various FlixPix animated feature films: each clip bright, colorful, funny, and hyperkinetic, but silent—there's no sound at all. From behind the monitor comes a slim, medium-tall man in a black-and-silver L. A. Kings jersey over jeans and running shoes. He gives the animatronic tram driver an affectionate pat on the head and then walks back along the cars toward Chuck and Sarah, grinning puckishly.

"Rudy's my baby," the man says. "The first of many."

He reaches into the tram to shake first Sarah's, then Chuck's hand. "I'm Hamilton Su—chief creative officer. Thank you both for coming to see me, Mr. and Ms. Carmichael."

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Su," replies Chuck with a tinge of excitement.

"Hello," says Sarah, eyeing him more warily.

Su jumps up into the tram and takes the empty bench seat facing the one where Chuck and Sarah are seated.

"My apologies if all this seems rather un-businesslike," Su tells them, gesturing at the tram. "But right now, I can't be sure that anywhere else on our campus is secure enough."

He points to the big monitor screen. "We always bring the tour groups in here first—show them some classic clips like these, and then a short on the making of whatever feature's in production at the time. The next is _Get The Zoomies,_ which we've scheduled for a summer 2013 release."

"You're worried about security in your own office," Sarah observes. "So it must be a problem with industrial espionage."

"Correct, Ms. Carmichael. It's been going on for some time now, and getting steadily worse. For example, you might have heard that FlixPix has lately been embroiled in a lawsuit with two low-budget foreign producers over copyright infringement."

"I do remember reading something about that…yeah," replies Chuck. "Don't recall any of the details though."

"By design. We've tried to keep it all on the down-low, and that's not easy in Hollywood. Our competitors somehow came into possession of a big chunk of a project that we already had in rendering—including all of the principal characters and many of the plot elements—and then tried to rush out their own cheap copy six months in advance of our scheduled release."

Chuck whistles. "Wow—that's brazen. Did you want us to gather evidence for that case?"

"No," Su says, "we'll let legal run with that one. The more pressing problem—the reason I brought you in—is that I'm certain there's still a spy or a mole active in our organization. Somebody who is using our own computer systems against us. And it's not just _Zoomies_ at risk. The stakes are much higher, as you'll see."

He takes a smartphone from his pocket. "But before I continue, I need to confirm that you signed our nondisclosure agreement and the other papers."

"We have," Sarah answers. "This morning, before we left, and we e-mailed everything to the address you gave us."

"Great. Forgive me if I check on that real quick. It's just company policy." Su puts the phone to his ear and has a brief, subdued conversation with someone, then turns his attention back to Chuck and Sarah.

"Okay—we're all good. Now I can show you what I'm talking about."

Su points his smartphone at the big screen and taps out a code on the keypad. The mosaic of film clips vanishes and is instantly replaced by the computer-generated face of a friendly-looking dog, which resembles a chocolate Labrador retriever but with floppier ears, a shorter snout, and wide humanlike green eyes. The character is looking at them with genial curiosity.

"Morning, Schnebly!" Su calls out.

"Hey hey hi, Hambone!" the dog replies.

"Y'know I'd really wish you'd stop calling me that," Su grumbles in sham irritation, as Chuck and Sarah softly chuckle. "But anyway, say hello to my friends here. Mister and Mizz Carmichael, this is Schnebly H. Rover."

"Helll- _lo,_ new friends!" Schnebly's eyes fix on Sarah, and his green irises spin like pinwheels for a moment, accompanied by a loud whir. "Specially hello _blondie_ —" he adds excitedly. "I mean I mean— _wuh-woof!"_

"Easy now, Schnebly," Su gently scolds. "The lady is married—and _you're_ a dog."

" _Been hit on by worse,"_ Sarah comments under her breath.

"Hambone—you're _killin'_ me here!" The virtual canine looks down his snout and snuffles loudly, pretending to sulk.

"Wait a minute," Chuck interjects. "This is all CGI?"

Schnebly looks up and straight at him, enthusiastically nods yes, and cocks his head sideways with a doggish grin and panting tongue.

Su turns toward Sarah and Chuck with a satisfied expression. "By any chance do you remember _Max Headroom?_ Maybe you're both too young for—"

"No, no—I've seen it," counters Chuck. "The old TV program…the character they called 'the world's first computer-generated show host'…right?"

"Right. Except _they_ used a live actor and just distorted his features with prosthetics and analog manipulation. But Schnebly here—he's gonna star in _Zoomies_ —he's the real deal!"

Chuck's eyes go almost as goofy as Schnebly's. "You mean you guys are embedding actual _artificial intelligence_ into CGI characters now?"

"Yepper," Su says proudly. " _And_ realistic emotions. Well…actually, those are still in beta, but we'll have them fully functional in just a few months. Which means, Mr. and Ms. Carmichael, that we at FlixPix are on the brink of radically changing our entire industry!"

" _This_ is what you're trying to protect, isn't it?" Sarah asks.

"Yes," replies Su. He aims his phone at the screen again—and Schnebly immediately lowers his ears, closes his eyes, and drops off to sleep—"and we need _you_ to help us do that. Our AI patents are pending and we're most vulnerable right now, so we want you to find this spy or spies before they can do _real_ damage."

Turning to Chuck, he continues, "And I'm told you're the best—our CEO just happens to be on the board of directors of La Plata Global Gaming, and he said they call you the _'_ cyber-whisperer.'"

Sarah smiles and stealthily squeezes Chuck's knee.

Su leans closer to them both and lowers his voice. "But besides that…I think you two will have to work undercover in our firm. Do you have any of _that_ kind of experience?"

"A little," says Sarah, poker-faced—and Chuck squeezes her hand squeezing his knee.

"But it means you'd have to give us pretty much free rein, Mr. Su," he says.

"That's right," Sarah concurs. "I'll need access to all of your personnel files, _and_ full authority to interview anyone—from janitor to executive—who might have useful intel. You can rest assured they'll never know what I'm really looking for."

"And I'll need physical access to your data centers," adds Chuck. "Most likely I'll have to probe your networks. I can do that either through the front door—or the back door. Your preference."

Now Su looks a little bit intimidated, but he nods in agreement.

" _Riiight_ then…okay, I guess you _have_ done this kind of work before. Good…that's good. Ms. Carmichael, we'll make your cover a manager in Human Resources—we'll say you just transferred down from our Bay Area studios…."

"And Mr. Carmichael, you can be an executive tech-support admin reporting directly to me. That would give you access to any computer in the company, large or small. Front door."

"Perfect," says Chuck.

Su taps at his smartphone. "Then I'll set everything up today and have a courier deliver your ID badges no later than this evening. So you both can start right in tomorrow morning."

"That'll be all, Schnebly," he calls out, over his shoulder, at the screen. "See ya!"

The CGI dog abruptly awakens, winks at them, then turns and bounds away toward a distant virtual horizon. Next on the screen: the visage of a slightly pudgy, wryly smiling man: balding in the front and white-haired on the sides; wearing a Hawaiian shirt, FlixPix baseball cap, and wire-frame glasses; with one hand held up to casually wave goodbye.

"Isn't that _Ted Roark?"_ Sarah asks—and she's surprised when, at that same instant, Chuck's entire body tenses alongside her. Su doesn't notice, as he's gazing almost worshipfully at the image on the six-story screen.

"Yes it is, Ms. Carmichael," says Su after a long pause. "This sound stage was named in Mr. Roark's honor. He founded this company, you know. He liked to come out here sometimes and mingle with the tour groups."

He waves toward the screen. "We do this as a remembrance, and this way he still gets to send our visitors off to their next stop like he used to."

"I…see," replies Sarah softly. Chuck says nothing. It's obvious to Sarah that he's suddenly very uneasy, but she doesn't know why.

Su looks wistfully at them both. "Ted Roark was my mentor—I loved that man. He was taken away from us much too soon…much too soon…." 

* * *

**Fifteen minutes later, back on the freeway**

"So…what is it about Ted Roark?" Sarah asks Chuck as she slips the Lotus into the near-empty carpool lane.

"Hah—where to begin…? Let's see. Well, first Roark was my dad's colleague and then he was his nemesis. At one time or another he tried to kill my dad, kill me, you—the whole family while he was at it—"

_(Flashback to Roark hoisting a shotgun at Chuck, in the middle of Ellie and Devon's ruined church wedding….)_

" _And_ he was Fulcrum," Sarah blurts out. "Terminated by the Ring."

"That's right babe—you _remember!"_

"Bits and pieces," Sarah replies with a shrug. "But listen to this, sweetie—what if Roark planted other Fulcrum agents inside FlixPix? For cover maybe? After Roark was dead and Fulcrum was no more, they would've needed something else to do."

"Like selling company secrets? Brilliant thinking, Sarah—as usual. Gives us a great place to start too. You can pull files on the shady characters and I'll see if I flash on any of them."

"What if one of _them_ turns out to be Hambone?"

"But I didn't flash on him….then again, I never flashed on Roark himself either."

"Mister Su isn't off the hook just yet, I'd say. He could just be another bad guy trying to use us to do his dirty deeds. We'll have to keep an eye on him too."

"Yeah." Chuck leans back in his seat, slaps his forehead, and laughs. "First Professor Fleming and now Ted freakin' Roark. We still haven't figured out how to shake our past, have we babe? You and I just don't _do_ normal, I suppose."

"It's okay," Sarah assures him. "Who needs normal when we do _together_ so well?" She shoots her husband an air kiss and guns the Lotus back into Burbank.

* * *

**Meanwhile, at the Burbank Buy More**

_(Music: "Been Away Too Long," by Soundgarden)_

The big-box store has just opened for the day and there are only a few customers about, including a few who are striding forcefully across the sales floor toward the Customer Service desk carrying defective appliances. No employee is there to serve them, of course. All the Herders in their white oxfords and narrow ties and the Buy Morons in their green polos are clustered around the Nerd Herd counter, gaping and guffawing at something playing on a laptop screen.

" _All-new minions…same old slackery,"_ mutters Morgan, as he makes his way from the front entrance to the Home Theater Room, slinking along the far wall, head down, to minimize the possibility of being recognized.

Reaching his goal, he peeks inside, confirms that nobody's there…then swiftly enters, heads to the curved back corner of the room, and reaches behind for the concealed keypad that opens the secret elevator to Castle—but his fingers encounter only a bare cinder-block wall.

" _Huh?"_ Morgan asks out loud, and gropes around in panic. "Gone? It's gone… _How could it be gone?"_ But there's no hidden keypad—and no access to the secret elevator!

He drops his arms to his sides and takes a deep Zen breath.

" _Okay Morgan—don't freak out—Plan B..."_ With that, he's off to the employee lounge, and his luck holds when he finds that room also unoccupied.

Wasting no time, Morgan goes over to the lockers and yanks on the pair in the middle that's configured to swing out and give access to the emergency tunnel into Castle. But they don't budge! Thinking he might have forgotten which two are the right lockers, Morgan moves down the line and tugs on each. Every one is just as securely fastened to the wall.

 _Elevator gone…tunnel gone…_ Morgan feels momentarily sick. But he takes another deep breath, stands up straight, sets his jaw, and heads for—

* * *

**Big Mike's office**

The hefty manager of the Buy More, having just polished off two entire steak, egg, and melty cheese breakfast sandwiches—fresh from the in-store _Subway_ ® a few steps away—crumples up the wrappers and used napkins, and slumps contentedly in his chair.

But Big Mike's food coma is short-lived, as Morgan dramatically throws open the door and storms in. Big Mike is inwardly delighted to see him, but he puts on a gruff expression.

" _Huh!_ Didn't think it would take ya this long, son…but I _knew_ you'd be back," he rumbles. "Too bad your old job's no longer available"—he pats his name badge—"but you're still family and I haven't hired me an _assistant_ manager yet, so—"

"Not interested, Big Mike," Morgan cuts in curtly.

"You mean _Dad,"_ Big Mike corrects him.

"Dad. Whatever. I'm here for a different reason. You've been fully briefed, haven't you?"

Big Mike's eyes narrow, and he leans forward over his desk. "Briefed about _what,_ son?"

"About the security business that Chuck, Sarah, and I have been running for the past several years—and our secret base located under this store. Which until recently, was actually owned by Chuck and Sarah."

Big Mike shakes his head. "That was one hell of a cock-an'-bull story when those two fools Jeff and Lester tried to sell it. And it don't sound any more true comin' from you _either,_ son. You sure you're not really here for that assistant manager job….?"

"Never mind that," replies Morgan in mounting exasperation. "We had several concealed access routes from _this_ store down into _our_ facility and now they're all gone! What the _hell_ is happening here…Dad?"

"I don't know what you're blabberin' about," Big Mike says. "Only thing that's happening is that the new owners are a _lot_ more concerned about efficiency and savings. Good thing, too, in my book. Last week they did an energy audit for the whole store—said they found a lot of cracks and leaks needed sealing up. Especially out back in the storeroom and lounge."

Morgan puts his face in his hands. "Energy audit…So naturally you had the work done—"

"Right away! Cinder block, caulk, weatherstripping, paint—the new owners paid for everything. Said it'll cut our cooling and heating expenses in half!" Morgan groans, and Big Mike looks at him with concern. "What's _wrong,_ son?"

Before Morgan can respond, Big Mike looks up and behind him with an amused smile as Chuck and Sarah come into the office.

"Well, well, here's Bartowski and Blondie! Sorry— _Mrs._ Bartowski, I mean. C'mon in! So how's the— _heh, heh_ — _spy_ business going these days?"

"Uh…Morgan?" Chuck asks, troubled by his friend's demeanor and Big Mike's comment. "What's going _on_ here, buddy?"

"Big problem," Morgan replies.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I absolutely, positively do not own Chuck (not to say that I wouldn't love to if I could).

**Around midnight, in the parking lot directly outside of the Burbank Buy More**

The Buy More and the other mall stores are closed and the parking lot is nearly empty, except for a few vehicles scattered widely about. Enter a familiar silver Mitsubishi van, its side windows decked out with beer-bottle motif curtains and plastic chile-pepper lights, crawling slowly out to the most distant reaches of the lot, in the deep shadows beyond the last row of light poles. It pulls up alongside a nondescript manhole cover and stops, and its headlights go dark.

The side door of the van slides open. Sarah, Morgan, Alex, and Chuck, the driver—each of them garbed ninja-style in black from head to toe—all pile out onto the pavement. The pockets of Chuck's and Morgan's outfits are stuffed with tools and whatever spy gear they could rustle up from their apartments, while Sarah carries only her pistol.

"Leave the door open, _puh-lease!"_ Sarah groans as she waves a hand furiously in front of her face. "That van needs serious airing out."

"Are you positive they both went to Germany?" asks Alex. "It sure smells like somebody died back there." She gratefully takes in a lungful of gasoline-scented San Fernando Valley night air.

"Yeah, I know—but it's great cover," Chuck replies. "The local authorities are used to seeing Jeff's van parked around here at all hours."

He points to the darkened Buy More across the parking lot and shakes his head.

"They'd have done us a favor by sealing off Castle— _if_ we'd already had a good alternate route in place. But now we're left with just one way in. Maybe." He gets to his knees beside the manhole cover and runs his hands across the patterned surface, feeling for a handhold.

"And maybe we won't even need to use Castle very much longer," Sarah suggests, in a hopeful tone.

Chuck looks up and gives his wife a knowing smile and a nod—then turns his attention back to the manhole. Grunting, he tugs hard at the heavy iron lid and pulls it free. The others crowd around the opening. Chuck aims a flashlight beam down the manhole, revealing a ladder along one side, which bottoms out at a junction with a horizontal tunnel.

"According to the Intersect, we go thirty-four feet down, turn right, follow the power cables two hundred and fifty feet to the west, and that brings us to the outer wall of the extension that the NCS built onto Castle for the Greta project."

"Which your friend Vivian Volkoff's man blew up," Morgan adds.

"Yeah, I know. But there is—or _was_ —an emergency escape hatch in the bulkhead. Sure hope that'll still be there. Our next option after that would be hammering through a wall in the Buy More or the Orange Orange."

"Another night, another creepy tunnel," says Sarah as she leans on her husband's arm and peers down into the shaft. "Our evenings out are getting a bit predictable, wouldn't you say, sweetheart?"

Chuck laughs and starts descending the ladder, and Sarah and Morgan follow him. Alex, wearing an earpiece to keep in contact with the rest of the team, remains up top to keep an eye out for security guards or nosy interlopers.

_(Music: "The Base," by Paul Banks)_

At the bottom of the shaft, Chuck snaps a small monitoring device off his belt to check for noxious gases. "Air's fine," he announces after a few seconds. "The ventilation system must still be working. Smells better down here than in the van, actually."

But as they make their way along the concrete-lined tunnel, beneath thick power cables suspended from the ceiling, they find that the conditions get much worse. The floor, ceiling, and walls are streaked with black soot, which becomes thicker the farther in they go. The power cables abruptly terminate, their ends melted and charred. Farther ahead, the tunnel walls are full of spidery, scary cracks—and the ceiling looks ready to collapse at any time.

Chuck, Sarah, and Morgan cautiously press on. After they reach the blackened, tortured steel bulkhead of the NCS Intersect lab, they locate the emergency hatch—only to discover that the force of the bomb blast from the other side has warped it from a circular to a twisted oval shape, and irretrievably welded it shut.

"That's not good," says Morgan.

"I was afraid of this," Chuck admits. He leans out onto the bulkhead for a closer look at the damaged hatch, as Sarah stands behind him and keeps a wary eye on the crumbling walls all around.

"This is all steel plate," she observes. "Can't we just cut our way through that?"

"That's what I was thinking too," Chuck says as he gently taps on the bulkhead, "except that it'll be tricky with the tunnel around us in such bad shape. Still, it's worth a try if we can wrangle a cutting torch down here—and we'll also need hard hats and emergency air."

"We can rent all that stuff from the House O'Tools in the mall," Morgan chimes in.

Chuck gets back to his feet and nods. "Right. I need you and Alex to take care of that in the morning, while Sarah and I get started over at FlixPix. Then back here, same bat-time tomorrow night."

"Tomorrow will be a long day," says Sarah. "We should go home now and get some rest."

Chuck turns and takes hold of her hand, and they carefully make their way back to the ladder and up to the surface, with Morgan right behind them.

"Hey, can I drive us home?" Morgan asks when they return to the van.

* * *

**A little later, in Chuck and Sarah's apartment**

Chuck stands at the bathroom mirror, lethargically brushing his teeth, his mind elsewhere.

"Did you fall in?" Sarah calls out, impatiently, from the bedroom.

"Huh? Oh yeah, no—sorry, babe." Chuck puts his toothbrush down, rinses his mouth, and steps out of the bathroom. "Just wondering how I'm going to be able to build more Keys for Ellie if we can't get back into Castle."

"You'll figure it all out," says Sarah. "But how about we put it aside for tonight?"

She's in bed with the covers pulled high, so only her head is visible. Her honey-gold hair is feathered across her pillow and she's got a mischievous look on her face. Chuck gazes at his wife's beautiful features, and the joy in his eyes evidences that he's already stopped worrying about Castle.

Then he notices—for the first time—that Sarah has his little drawing of the two of them and the baby and the dream house propped up prominently amidst the framed pictures near her side of the bed. A bit surprised by this, but delighted and eager to get close to his wife, Chuck starts to lift the covers and climb into bed beside her—until she abruptly barks _"Wait!"_

Her bare right arm emerges from beneath the covers, and she points to his green _Om Nom Nom_ T-shirt. _"That_ has to come off."

Chuck complies, and then Sarah points to his pajama bottoms. "Those too."

"Okay, baby," he says, his chocolate-brown eyes twinkling, "but what are _you_ wearing—or not wearing—under there?"

" _That,"_ Sarah replies, "is for me to know and for you to find out."

* * *

**Meanwhile, close by in Morgan and Alex's apartment**

Curling up against drowsy Alex, and drifting toward sleep himself, Morgan is suddenly seized by an inspiration. His eyes snap open and he sits upright.

" _Hmmm what…?"_ murmurs his bedmate—but then she turns on her side, and starts snoring softly, before Morgan can say anything to her. So he takes that as tacit approval of what he's going to do, gently untangles himself from the blankets, slips out of bed, and puts his black spy suit back on.

He pads quietly into the living room and turns on a light. All over the shelves and tables around him—not yet replaced by the things that would prove that Alex had really moved into the apartment—are various mission mementos and other possessions of Colonel John Casey, left behind in his rush to go track down his beloved Gertrude Verbanski.

But some of Casey's more insidious personal items were not left in plain sight. For example: a locked weapons case that Morgan now pulls out from beneath the couch. Casey never knew that Morgan had deduced the combination to the lock some time ago: _1-9-8-0-1-1_ , the year and month when Ronald Reagan was first elected President. Morgan opens the case, remembering something he'd seen in there: a military-drab heavy cardboard box stenciled with the words LIMPETS, THERMITE, ARMOR-CUTTING. Inside the shoebox-sized carton are six coal-black disks the size and appearance of hockey pucks. Morgan removes two of them, then closes and latches the weapons case and slips it back under the couch.

He drops the limpets into pockets in his spy suit, grabs the keys to Jeff's van, and heads out the door.

* * *

**Some time later**

Chuck and Sarah are sprinting side-by-side, propelled by equal measures of terror and disgust, down a long, long, _long_ hallway with rusty metal walls and poor lighting, toward an open doorway just ahead of them. Just beyond the doorway are daylight and blue sky.

Behind them is a greyish, hissing, swirling cloud of flying insects with smoky-colored wings, red eyes, and long legs: kind of like moths, kind of like praying mantises. Without breaking stride, Chuck looks back over his shoulder for a moment. The insects are gaining on them.

"Hurry…Sarah… _hurry!"_ Chuck gasps between increasingly labored breaths. His legs feel more and more leaden. And the doorway doesn't seem to be getting any closer.

" _Chuck—look!"_ cries Sarah. Their exit is closing: a heavy armored door is slowly, inexorably sliding sideways across the opening. They're not going to make it—but then they're there—but there's not enough time and the door's about to close completely….

Only one thing to do—Chuck pushes Sarah to safety through what's left of the opening just before the door seals shut. He hears her muffled scream, _"Noooo!"_ from the other side, and then he's enveloped by the cloud of insects—they start to light all over his body; they're crawling on him…it… _tickles?_

" _Chuck…?"_

Helplessly laughing, he flails around, trying to sweep the insects off, but they grip him tightly with their legs. One of them is climbing from his chin onto his cheek, its tiny multifaceted red eyes looking into his—and then, it extends its pointed mandibles—

" _Sweetie?_ Wake up, c'mon…"

Chuck wakes up. His forehead is damp with sweat. Sarah is gently shaking his arm, looking into his face with concern. Down lower, her smooth warm flesh is still pressed against his, just as it was when they fell asleep entwined and satiated…whenever that was….?

"Whoa— _not_ a fun dream," mutters Chuck. "Big bugs chasing us and crawling all over me."

"Like Saldana's nano-drones attacking us last week?" Sarah muses, as she reaches around beside the bed for something to mop her husband's brow, and finds his bunched-up green T-shirt. Beneath it is Chuck's iPhone—which suddenly starts playing Toto's " _Africa_."

Sarah sighs and passes him the phone, then tenderly daubs his forehead with the shirt as he picks up the call.

" _Morgan!_ What're you calling for at _this_ time of the—"

" _Chuck—I'm back at the mall. There's trouble…you and Sarah better get here quick…"_

* * *

**Sixteen minutes later, outside of the Burbank Buy More once again**

Sarah at the wheel of the Lotus gets them there fast. This time, the parking lot is full of vehicles and frenetic activity, but not of a kind they would have wanted to see: flashing red and blue lights, police cruisers, fire trucks, an ambulance, and a conspicuously placed Southern California Gas Company repair truck. In the middle of it all is Jeff's van, again parked alongside the manhole leading to the secret NCS lab.

Everything in the immediate vicinity of the manhole has been hosed down, and the Burbank firefighters are rolling up their hoses and packing their gear. Four emergency workers in work jackets and white Gas Company hard hats are standing in a cluster, talking amongst themselves while one of them takes notes on a tablet computer.

Sarah stops the Lotus and douses her headlights at a good distance from the action, intending to give the impression of a pair of casual civilian rubberneckers, while she and Chuck figure out what to do next. But just then, one of the Gas Company workers turns and looks straight at them for a moment. Strangely for the middle of the night, she dons a pair of dark glasses and keeps staring.

"Those _might_ just be safety glasses," says Chuck, "but I'll bet they're night-vision goggles."

They hold their position, but Sarah's right hand slips down to the pistol in her waistband. Presently, the hard-hatted woman watching them removes her glasses and says something to a nearby police officer, who goes over to the Lotus on Sarah's side. He signals to her to lower her window. She and Chuck wonder if he's going to order them to move on, but instead:

"Ma'am, they want you to drive up next to that ambulance over there. Incident commander needs to have a word with you."

So Sarah pilots the Lotus right into the middle of the whole scene.

"We've been made," she notes calmly. "They were waiting for us."

"Sure hope Morgan's okay," adds Chuck fervently.

"Yes…at least until _we_ have a chance to kill him."

The woman in the Gas Company hard hat is waiting for them at the back end of the ambulance. Her size and build are similar to Sarah's, but she is African-American. The expression on her face reveals nothing about her intent.

"Good morning," the woman begins. "You're Carmichael Industries—am I correct?"

"You're correct," replies Chuck. "And _you_ are…?"

"Tameka Cliff." She reveals an NSA badge and identification card. "Special Agent for Physical Asset Protection. I presume you know why we're all here."

She opens the back doors of the ambulance. All alone inside, sitting forlornly on a gurney, is Morgan.

"This way, please." Tameka ushers them all inside the ambulance and closes the doors. Morgan looks up at his friends with a mix of relief and embarrassment. His spy suit is disheveled and his face is streaked with soot, but he appears to be whole and unhurt. One sharp glare from Sarah cuts him off before he can say anything.

"Your associate," says Tameka, nodding at Morgan, "used some kind of explosive device to try and gain entry to the abandoned NCS research facility beneath this parking lot."

" _Whaaat?"_ Chuck yells. " _Explosives!_ What were you _thinking_ , buddy?"

"I was _thinking_ about saving us time and effort," Morgan retorts, as he sits up with a bit of self-assurance. "I mean—I figured it was _already blown up,_ so what more damage could there be?"

Rendered speechless, Chuck gapes at him, while Sarah just shakes her head.

"As it turned out," Tameka adds, "nothing much _did_ happen, except for a lot of smoke. We've been able to pass it off as a minor gas leak and explosion."

"So how much trouble are we in?" Chuck asks her.

"NCS no longer has any interest in the abandoned lab, and we know that the Castle infrastructure that extends beyond that is Carmichael property. But still…you understand that we cannot permit any public attention to be drawn to these facilities—now _or_ in the future."

"Agreed," says Sarah. "And _our_ plan is to eventually phase out Castle anyway. But first, we need to get back inside."

"I can help you with that," Tameka replies—evoking stunned looks from all three members of Team Carmichael. "I've been authorized to build you a new secure entrance to Castle. You just need to tell us where you want it to come out."

"Wow," Morgan says. "So, guys, guess I—"

"If I may ask," interjects Chuck, "who sent you? General Beckman? Or Director Bentley, perhaps?"

"Don't ask," says Tameka.

"Well, whoever it was—tell them thanks."

"I will, but at any rate, Carmichael Industries will be getting the bill for the work."

Chuck and Sarah turn to each other with sly smiles and mutter, _"Beckman."_

Tameka, acting as if she didn't hear that, leans forward and shakes hands all around. "I think that's all I need for the time being. Oh, one more thing—since you no longer have any official connection to the Buy More store—it might interest you to know there's a vacancy in a nice quiet office complex just on the other side of this very parking lot."

"Hmm…we _could_ be interested in that possibility," says Chuck as he rises from his seat.

"With lots of big windows," Tameka adds, looking right at Sarah.

Chuck's eyebrows lift and he scrutinizes the NSA agent, wondering if she actually _knew_ that a space with windows would particularly appeal to his Castle-weary wife. Then he shrugs his shoulders and reaches for the door to exit the ambulance—but _freezes_ when he hears a familiar booming voice, more than loud enough to penetrate the vehicle and echo around inside for all to hear….

" _There it is! That's Barnes's pervy van, parked right here! I KNEW it! I KNEW those two clowns were behind this somehow! Just like last time! Where the hell are they? I'm gonna pound 'em both…!"_

"Ummm…uhh…Agent Cliff?" Chuck nervously asks. "Do you mind if the three of us stay in here for a little while longer?"


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own a single molecule of Chuck and I intend no copyright infringement.

**Second day, morning**

Sarah arrives at the main gate of the FlixPix studios in a rented lime-green VW Beetle, sporting big round sunglasses and a full-on smile for the gate guard—not the same one who encountered her in the Lotus yesterday—she'd checked the shift schedule to make sure of that. The guard finds it something of a challenge to take his eyes off Sarah long enough to scope her ID badge.

"Sarah Kent?" he asks. "You're new here, aren't you?"

"Right you are, honey! An' that's _real_ nice of y'all to notice an' make me feel more welcome—"

"It's my job to notice, ma'am," the guard replies with a chuckle. "But yes, of course—welcome. Welcome. So you're in HR?"

"Right again! Jus' transferred down here from the San Bruno studios. Ah'm gonna be the one makes sure all y'all get paid on time, and such."

"You don't sound like you're from the Bay Area though," the guard notes as he passes the badge back down to Sarah.

"Well, aren't y'all jus' the observant one? Ye-es, ah'm originally from Georgia. An' so very, very glad to be in a sunny warm place again _finally!"_

"That's nice. Well, hope you keep liking it here, and you have a great day now, ma'am," offers the guard, as he waves her through the gate toward the employee parking lot.

Sarah's demeanor instantly changes from bubbly to focused as she leaves her car and walks briskly in her floral print A-line skirt and button-down silk blouse through the sliding blue-glass doors of the main administrative building, through the busy lobby, and up a flight of stairs to the Human Resources office. A cubicle waits for her: with a desktop computer, speakerphone, _Get the Zoomies in 2013_ coffee mug, and even a yellow rose in a bud vase. Sarah boots the computer, logs into the network, and immediately starts scanning personnel files.

* * *

Almost immediately afterward, Chuck gets off an L.A. Metro bus at a stop across the street from the main gate, and enters the studios on foot in an outfit reminiscent of his Nerd Herd days: white shirt, dark slacks, a few small tools and pens in a pocket protector, iPhone on his belt, and his FlixPix badge hanging on a purple lanyard embellished with the company's various cartoon characters. The same gate guard who chatted up Sarah a moment earlier offers him no conversation.

Chuck makes his way to the front of the employee commissary next door to the admin building, and a moment later an electric golf cart pulls up with Hamilton Su riding in the back. Su waves to Chuck, who climbs in alongside him—and barely has a chance to take his seat before the driver hits the accelerator. The cart carries them swiftly and silently into the maze of oddly-shaped buildings all in deep-blue glass and rainbow-hued steel framing.

"Good morning, Mr. Carmichael," says Su. "First day on the job going smoothly so far?"

"So far," Chuck replies. "Sarah's already in place, and I'm ready to learn everything I can about your operation."

"Normally I'd have sent someone from my staff to show you around, but I'm acting on your recommendation to keep your circle of friends here as small as possible."

"I appreciate that, Mr. Su," says Chuck. "I know your time's valuable."

Su waves the comment off. "You're right...but it's well worth it if you can fix our little problem."

* * *

Over the next hour, Su leads a wide-eyed but carefully observant Chuck on an in-depth tour of the production process at FlixPix. They walk through row after row of design stations where artists work at powerful graphics terminals drafting CGI characters, props, and scenery; peek into storyboarding labs where assistant directors and production designers lay out and argue over entire scenes on room-sized high-res touchscreens; and even make a visit to a recording session where Stephen Colbert is reading dialogue.

The final stop is a sprawling single-story building at the very center of the complex. Given a casual glance it appears to match the structures all around it in FlixPix's signature blue glass, but Chuck immediately notices that all of its windows are opaque and it is unmarked, except for a big sign curiously emblazoned with a cartoonish farm scene: a ramshackle red barn, three bulging silos, and a cud-chewing, bored-looking brown cow. A pair of security guards is stationed just inside the front entrance.

"Ever since we discovered we had a leak, we've had to post extra guards all over," Su says. "A shame." He enters the building in front of Chuck, so that the guards will recognize him and wave the two of them on.

Su and Chuck pass through a pair of heavy sliding glass doors into a well-lit, air-conditioned room, packed floor to ceiling on each side with high-performance computer systems, softly humming and blinking their LEDs behind glass partitions. A single aisle, extending down the center of the room between the opposing banks of computers, ends at a control console at the far side, where two young women are intently studying a digital flow chart displayed on a large overhead monitor, and occasionally tapping on touchscreens.

"Welcome to the Render Farm," Su says with a flourish of his hand. "Massively upgraded about eight months ago, specifically for the _Zoomies_ project and our intelligent CGI."

"This is _verrrry_ impressive," comments Chuck, looking the computers over with an expert eye as he follows Su down the central aisle.

"Thank you. I'm sure you're aware it takes major computing power to render all the CGI for a full-length animated feature—and our IT innovations have upped that requirement by at least an order of magnitude. This facility is the best in the business—not just in power and speed—but energy efficiency, fire suppression system…you name it, we built it in."

They reach the control console, and Su pats the shoulders of the two operators, who smile and nod but otherwise remain focused on their work.

"These 'render wranglers' assign each incoming image-processing job to one of the computers in this building. Could be anything from the curly hairs in a character's oversized nostril to an entire frame."

"Where does the output go?" asks Chuck.

"Good question," Su replies. "Come this way and I'll show you—oh, wait— _hah!—_ have a look at _that!"_

Su points up at the overhead monitor, where Schnebly has suddenly appeared in the middle of the flow chart. The CGI canine bounds exuberantly all around the screen, jumping on and off of graphical windows and chewing playfully on lines and vectors as if they are bones. But the two render wranglers go right on with their tasks, unfazed.

"Is that _supposed_ to be happening?" Chuck asks in amazement.

"Yes," says Su. "All part of the cognitive growth of an intelligent CGI character at FlixPix. Schnebly is going to live forever within the bounds of the virtual world of this feature film, including its creation—so we give him and the other characters the run of the production process intranet. May be unorthodox but it helps his personality and emotions develop."

Schnebly looks down at the two men and winks one green doggy eye at them.

"So he's _not_ just a CGI character," Chuck realizes. "He's an _assobot!"_

"A _what?"_

"An autonomous sentient software bot. _Assobot_ for short—it came from the name of a Japanese manga character, I think."

"Never heard that term before," notes Su, "but I guess it sounds about right."

"Believe me, I didn't make it up," Chuck says dryly. "You were going to show me where—"

"Oh, yeah." Su ushers him through a nearby door in the glass wall on one side of the room. They continue on a short distance to a cluster of three refrigerator-sized plexiglass cabinets: each one containing ten sizable hard drives, stacked vertically on shelves.

"We call these _silos_. Each silo is a one-exabyte storage system. The finished rendering jobs are downloaded to these, before they go back into the production stream. All three of these big babies are busy 24/7."

Chuck steps closer for a better look, then points to the middle silo. "Not _this_ one. Looks like it's shut off or down." Its cooling fans are off and its LED lights are all glowing steady red.

"Really?" asks Su in surprise, looking over Chuck's shoulder. "I wasn't aware—"

" _That_ one's been trouble from the day we installed it," says somebody behind them, in a mildly irritated voice. Chuck and Su turn and find a pudgy middle-aged man with glasses and a grey comb-over, standing with his hands on his hips.

"Just lucky we still have enough capacity with the other two," the man continues. "At least for now." Then he steps around Su and Chuck and gently—almost reassuringly—lays a hand on top of one of the two working silos.

"This is Holmberg," says Su. "Senior technician for the Render Farm. Holmberg, meet my new tech admin Charles Carmichael. It's his first day and I'm showing him around."

"You must be high-octane to rate Mister Su himself as your tour guide," Holmberg comments as he lowers his glasses and looks appraisingly at Chuck.

"Well…I don't know about _that,_ " Chuck answers after a moment. "I'm only here to help."

Su chuckles. "Maybe he can even help _you_ figure out the problem with your silo, Holmberg."

"Maybe…" Holmberg says, but he looks quite unconvinced.

* * *

**Meanwhile, in the Human Resources office**

The arrival of a new and attractive blonde manager with a charming Southern accent doesn't go unnoticed. All morning, Sarah's targeted search through the company's personnel records is interrupted again and again, as curious male and female staffers wander into her cubicle. Each time it happens, Sarah shakes hands and offers a friendly smile, but appears anxious to get on with her work—and if necessary, makes a show of toying with her wedding ring—so most of her office mates exchange a few pleasantries with her and then go back to their own tasks.

But one—a slender, ponytailed, twenty-something man who comes in to file a new W-4 form and identifies himself as a character design artist—sticks around, pulling up a chair and sitting alongside Sarah's desk for interminable minutes. He makes flirtatious small talk while sketching intently with a digital pen on a tablet computer.

"With your looks and physique," he asks Sarah, "haven't you ever seen yourself as something _more_ than a payroll manager? Like maybe a warrior princess, or a superheroine…maybe a _spy?"_

The young artist turns his tablet around to reveal his sketch: Sarah in a black bodysuit, her hair flaring out behind; a fierce expression on her face; and aiming a pistol in an action pose.

"Oh mah _goodness,_ honey!" exclaims Sarah with a roll of her eyes. "That is definitely _not_ me!"

"Sure it is. You just haven't been discovered yet."

* * *

**Later, at Morgan and Alex's apartment**

By late morning Morgan has already polished off four grape sodas. The empty cans clutter the coffee table in front of him, and he's already started on a fifth soda. Alone in the apartment, looking frustrated and miserable, he sits on the couch in a sweatsuit, trying to distract himself by playing video games.

Unexpectedly, the front door opens—and there stands _John Casey_ —mighty in his black leather flight jacket, with his duffle bag slung over his shoulder.

"Mind if I come in?" he asks.

"It's your place," Morgan replies coolly. He doesn't even budge from the couch.

"Nice that you're excited to see me," Casey mutters. He drops the bag in the middle of the room and stands next to the couch, looking questioningly at Morgan.

"Didn't think I'd find you like _this,"_ he adds. "I thought you and Alex were working for Bartowski again."

Morgan snorts and puts down the game controller. "Yeah—but I'm not so sure now."

"Hunh," grunts Casey. He pulls up a chair and waits for the details. Morgan takes a big swig of grape soda, leans back on the couch, and continues his story.

"Chuck read me the riot act this morning about not sticking to the plan. Alex got pretty upset at me too."

"So you screwed up."

"Well…I guess…yeah, I did. I had this idea that I was sure was gonna work. But it didn't. Chuck's always had a much better sense than me of how far to push the envelope."

Casey nods, and Morgan shrugs.

"So…I'm thinking about going back to the Buy More. Big Mike offered me the assistant manager position—"

"That'd be _stupid_ , Grimes," Casey growls, leaning forward in his chair. "Really stupid. Geez, it's lucky for you I came back when I did—before you managed to forget _every damn thing_ I taught you! For example: there's a good reason for the chain of command."

"I know…I remember…" Morgan mumbles and looks down at the floor.

"Bartowski and Walker are the two most capable and best matched operatives I've ever worked with. Just follow their lead and you'll be fine. I'm sure you're not fired—not yet anyway."

Morgan chuckles at that, in spite of himself.

"And besides…my daughter deserves better than some ass-man from the Buy More—"

"Hey big guy—glad you're back!" Morgan jumps up from the couch and tries to hug Casey, who forcefully brushes him off—but he's smiling, too, nonetheless.

"By the way," Morgan continues, as Casey gets up and heads for the kitchen, "you and Gertrude…you aren't…you didn't…?"

"Nah," replies Casey. He finds a bottle of single-malt Scotch he had stashed away, and pours himself a few fingers' worth. "We completed our mission and now I'm giving her a head start on the next one." He takes a sip of Scotch, grunts appreciatively, and grins at Morgan.

"With her and me, the chase is always half the fun."

* * *

**Evening, in the Human Resources office at FlixPix**

After the rest of the HR staff has left for the day, Sarah continues to work in her cubicle in a mostly darkened office. Freed from distractions at last, she's now able to analyze personnel files much more efficiently, and she finishes her task a few minutes before Chuck joins her.

He greets his wife with a "Hey, beautiful," and puts a hand on her shoulder to swivel her around in her office chair for a sizzling hello kiss.

Sarah feels a little extra jolt of warmth as she abruptly remembers that—in his untucked white shirt with the pocket protector and the casually dangling FlixPix ID badge—Chuck looks a lot like he did when she first started working with him, minus the unruly hair. She shivers, and her eyes glaze over for a moment, and then she shakes off her reverie and pats the empty chair beside hers.

"Sit," she instructs her husband. "Let's get this done, because I am _so_ ready for a glass of wine and a nice quiet dinner after the day I've had in this meat market."

"Sorry to hear that, baby," says Chuck sympathetically. "You can tell me all about it later. I assume you've already swept for surveillance devices in here?"

"I did. Nothing but a few video cams on the ceiling, and none of 'em are facing this screen. Clearly FlixPix is much less concerned about its payroll than about its product."

"That helps." Chuck directs his attention to Sarah's computer monitor as she opens a desktop folder of personnel files, each of which features a high-res photo of the employee.

"As far as I could determine," Sarah explains, "these are _all_ of the people employed by FlixPix in any kind of IT or telecommunications capacity within the last eight months—just before the time when Mister Su figures their intellectual-property theft took place. So this should be everyone who would've had the expertise needed to pull it off. And be prepared…there are a _lot_ of files."

"You included _former_ employees, right?" asks Chuck, and Sarah nods.

"Good. Then let's see if any of these jokers were Fulcrum. I think I'll only need about a second on each face, but be ready to pause if you see me flash on any of them."

Chuck focuses on the screen as Sarah begins displaying the file photos in rapid succession: ten faces…twenty…fifty…one hundred…but no response. Five minutes pass, then ten, then fifteen—and Sarah gets to the last of the files without Chuck having flashed even once!

"Wow," says Chuck as he rubs his eyes. "I thought for sure there'd be _somebody_ shady in there. Maybe we should run through them all again—but a bit slower this time?"

"Okay," Sarah replies, but before she can navigate back to the top of the stack, she hears footsteps softly approaching the cubicle. She glances in the direction of the sound and whispers, _"Security!"_

Sarah hurriedly blanks the monitor screen, and Chuck drops beneath her desk, as if he's working on the CPU down there on the floor—but not before Sarah is able to withdraw her legs, so the security guard comes upon the two of them in a visibly compromising position.

" _Gooood_ evening," the guard harrumphs. "Working a little late, are we?"

"Computer emergency," says Chuck as he tries to extricate himself gracefully from under the desk. Sarah simply blushes.

"Uh _—huh,"_ replies the guard. "I don't recognize either of you, so I'm gonna have to see some IDs."

Sarah holds her badge out. Chuck gets free of the desk and his wife's long legs, looks up at the guard's face—and _flashes_ on him: _ex-Army—sharpshooter—sniper…Fulcrum!_

After the guard thoroughly examines their badges, and leaves them with a _tsk-tsk_ and a sarcastic grin, Chuck and Sarah turn to each other in surprise.

"Sarah, I just—"

"I saw you! The security force—dammit, we should've _thought_ of that!" Re-energized, Sarah turns back to her computer and starts typing. In minutes, she extracts all of the personnel files on the security guards and their command staff for Chuck to scan.

Then the Human Intersect determines that the majority of the rank-and-file guards are clean, but _all_ of the senior officers— _except one_ —are ex-Fulcrum.

"Seems strange," Sarah observes as she studies the file of the one non-Fulcrum officer: a pale, bald, eggheaded type with a beaky nose, black mustache, and fragile features, identified in the file as Sergeant Russ Pfeffer. "If all the other commanders were Fulcrum, why would they allow someone who _wasn't_ to work so close to them?"

"Dunno. But do you notice something else?" Chuck asks her. "All the ex-Fulcrum officers are big bruisers—John Casey types. But Sergeant Pfeffer here is downright scrawny by comparison."

"You're right," Sarah says—then snaps her fingers and returns to her keyboard. "You know, sweetie—I recognize this man—that nose, at least! I saw this photo earlier today…."

She reopens the folder with the IT personnel files, and after a minute or two of searching, locates a tech supervisor named Otto Liebert. Liebert's identification photo shows him to have a full head of curly, sandy hair; no mustache; thick glasses—and a prominent, pointy nose that looks identical to Sergeant Pfeffer's. Sarah posts the two photos side-by-side, and it's immediately apparent to her and to Chuck that Russ Pfeffer and Otto Liebert are one and the same.

"Whoa," says Chuck. "Shave Liebert's head, grow a mustache and dye it, trade the glasses for contacts…you get Pfeffer."

Sarah is reading Otto Liebert's file aloud: "Systems engineer. Worked here for five years and resigned from the company a little less than eight months ago. Says here he was put in charge of upgrading something called a Render Farm. Do you know what that is?"

"Yep. Walked all around it this morning. It's a very big and very secure computing facility. Everything that FlixPix creates passes through it at some point. Which _could_ make it the ideal place for a CGI-jacking—"

Sarah chortles and nudges him with her elbow. "You've been saving _that_ one up all day, haven't you?"

"Of course I have. But babe, the one problem with our theory is that Hamilton Su told me the Render Farm has an extra strong firewall within a firewall. I don't see how anything could be sneaked out of there, let alone a data package as big as an entire CGI film."

"Maybe that's what Su wants you to think," suggests Sarah. "Because guess who Otto Liebert's _boss_ was….?" She points out Su's name on the displayed file. "And look—only two weeks after Liebert quits FlixPix's IT department, his alter-ego Russ Pfeffer joins the security force…as _night shift guard supervisor!"_

"Minimizing the possibility of chance encounters with any former IT co-workers who'd recognize that distinctive sniffer of his. Hmmm."

Chuck and Sarah sit quietly next to each other, processing all of their discoveries.

"What's the plan, Chuck?" Sarah asks after a few minutes.

"Well…first I think I need a much closer look at the Render Farm," he decides. "Now, if you and I were _still_ working for the CIA—"

"—the two of us would be breaking in there _tonight,"_ Sarah concludes.

"Yeah. But I think that for Carmichael Industries, picking this up tomorrow morning will be fine. There's this one older guy working inside the Farm who might have some useful intel. I'll see him in the morning after you scope him out, and maybe you can dig up more on Sergeant Pfeffer too. Let's go home, baby."

Sarah stretches, yawns, and leans her head on Chuck's shoulder.

"I'm good with that," she murmurs. "I mean, we're talking industrial espionage here, right?—it's not like this is a matter of life and death."


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I'm just a Chuck fan: not anyone with any ownership of or control over the series.

**Third day, morning, at FlixPix**

Chuck, in a fresh work outfit largely identical to the one he'd worn yesterday, walks along a magenta-colored sidewalk across the middle of a well-groomed lawn, toward the low-slung Render Farm building, while speaking as inobtrusively as possible with Sarah on his encrypted iPhone.

"On my way to meet with Holmberg," he says. "What have you found on him?"

" _Arthur Holmberg? Not much. Steady and boring. Been with the company since it started in—umm, 1988…but nothing here suggests any prior direct ties to Roark. His file does show that Otto Liebert was his immediate supervisor for a while—but that seems to be true of pretty much everyone who worked in the Render Farm at that time."_

"Good. He's probably clean, but I'll try not to arouse any suspicions…just in case."

" _Roger that, sweetie. And I'll get back to work on Sergeant Pfeffer. Don't forget we have an appointment with the Realtor in Burbank at 1300 hours. Love you, Chuck."_

"I love you too, babe. Wish me luck."

* * *

**Shortly thereafter**

_(Music: "The Base," by Paul Banks)_

The Render Farm guards scan Chuck's ID badge and allow him access. Chuck walks casually down the central aisle. He gives a friendly wave to the two attractive twenty-something render wranglers on duty that morning, and they wave back as Chuck continues on to the thick glass inner door leading to the banks of graphics processors and the three silos.

Holmberg is hunched over a workbench in a far corner. Chuck raps emphatically on the glass. Holmberg looks up in surprise, then plods across the room to let him in.

"Carmichael," he says, in a tone just short of friendly. "Guess you're here about that balky silo. I didn't think Mr. Su was serious about sending you back."

"He's serious about productivity, Mr. Holmberg," answers Chuck, as he heads straight for the silos with Holmberg trailing nervously behind him. "But don't worry. I didn't come to step on your toes—just to see if I can be of any help to you."

"Well, he _is_ the boss," Holmberg sighs. "Okay then, have at it." He stands back—but not too far back—as Chuck begins to look over the malfunctioning middle silo from top to bottom.

"All right," Chuck begins, "first off I see that one of the stacked hard drives is absent from this unit—the bottom shelf's empty. But all ten shelves are filled in the silos on either side. What's with that?"

"The bottom one's an optional expansion slot," replies Holmberg. "We've never needed to fill it because this silo's been offline most of the time."

"That makes sense." Chuck gets to his knees, opens the transparent plastic front panel of the silo, and takes a penlight from his pocket protector. "And that'll let me check out what's in the back." He points the light into the empty compartment at the bottom of the silo, sees nothing inside except an unconnected port in the back wall—

—and flashes on it: _non-standard design—fits only one device—wi-fi transmitter—focused beam—Roark Instruments—model number RSIT-5854…_

A smile briefly crosses Chuck's face, although all that Holmberg is aware of is that he's staring into the expansion slot for an uncomfortably long moment.

"Something wrong?" Holmberg asks him.

"Hmm? Oh no, no." Chuck tucks the penlight back in his pocket and carefully closes the front panel, then stands up and turns toward Holmberg with a sheepish grin.

"You know, I'm not seeing any obvious problems with the equipment. So maybe it's a software issue—the operating system perhaps?"

Holmberg looks relieved.

"Yes…that's _exactly_ what I think too," he notes. "But unfortunately, I'm a hardware guy—and the OS programmers, to this point, haven't done jack squat to try and figure out the problem."

"Well, I know a little about operating systems," Chuck says. "If you'd be willing to e-mail me a copy of the manual, I'd be glad to take a shot at it."

"More than happy to do that, Mr. Carmichael." The two men shake hands and walk back to the glass door leading out into the central aisle. Holmberg holds the door open for Chuck.

But _just then_ —Schnebly reappears on the big monitor above the render wranglers' console. With his cheerfully silly chocolate Lab face filling up most of the screen, the canine assobot looks right at Chuck and Holmberg as they step through the door.

" _Wuh-woof!"_ he calls out. "Hey Chucky, whatcha doin' back in there? Where's blondie?"

"Just doin' a quick inspection," Chuck replies—carefully, through suddenly tensed jaws.

"Inspecting huh? That's funny! 'Cause that big machine you were just lookin' at? Everybody says it's broken—but I've been _inside_ it!"

"Really?" asks Chuck. He glances at Holmberg just as all color drains from the technician's face.

Schnebly grins like a wolf. "An' there's lots and lots and _lots_ of pretty _laaay-deees_ hiding in there! But they all look alike and they're kinda mean and they never talk to me or even wanna pet me, for Pete's sake…so it's boring, _borrr-ing!"_

He lifts his shaggy eyebrows at Chuck and asks, "So where's blondie?"

Chuck senses trouble. Trying to look thoroughly confused, he turns back toward Holmberg.

"Do you know what he… _it's_ …talking about?" he asks. "I have no idea."

" _Whaddya mean 'it'?"_ grumbles Schnebly in the background.

"N-no…I…I don't," Holmberg stammers. "Maybe some—uh—old character files. Could be some residual data on one of the hard drives. But I'm not aware of—"

"Well then!" interjects Chuck. "I really ought to be on my way. Lots to do. Thank you."

Holmberg just nods numbly. The two men shake hands again, awkwardly, looking each other in the eye, each waiting for the other to break the grip first. Then they both let go—and move off _very fast_ in opposite directions: Chuck strides briskly down the aisle, waves a salute to the guards at the door without slowing down, and pushes through the exit. Meanwhile, Holmberg rushes back to his workbench and picks up his phone.

"Security please….This is Holmberg in the Render Farm. I need you to connect me with Sergeant Pfeffer _now._ Yes, his home phone if that's what… _yes,_ wake him up if you have to…."

Back out on the magenta sidewalk, halfway across the lawn and still walking fast, Chuck pulls out his own iPhone.

"Sarah. Babe. Schnebly just blabbed out something in there I think I wasn't supposed to know. I think I might be compromised."

" _Wait, what—Schnebly? Okay, can you make it to the car?"_

Chuck quickly scans his surroundings: no uniformed security in sight. "Yeah, I think so."

" _On my way there now."_

From the Render Farm to the main parking lot is more than halfway across the sprawling FlixPix campus. Chuck starts jogging: weaving around and through the clusters of artists and techs and office workers as they diffuse leisurely among the oddly shaped deep-blue buildings. Then he unexpectedly flashes _,_ and a shortcut to the parking lot instantly morphs in his mind.

" _Glad I read up on the layout of this place,"_ he mutters to himself.

Chuck leaves the sidewalk and ducks into the buildings themselves, turning left and right into corridors without any real idea of where they lead. But the Intersect is unerring, and barely five minutes later, Chuck pops out through the last door with the parking lot right in front of him! He spots Sarah's lime-green VW Beetle. His wife is standing there anxiously at the driver's-side door, craning her neck, trying to locate him.

" _Hey! Stop! Hold it right there, you!"_

Two grim-looking security men head toward him in a FlixPix electric golf cart. Of course it wasn't going to be so easy to get away: they were _waiting_ for Chuck to show up here! Chuck keeps running, mentally comparing his remaining distance to the parking lot to the approach of the security guards. Then Sarah sees what's happening and comes sprinting across the parking lot to help him, with her pistol in her right hand.

And into the middle of the impending implosion comes— _Rudy Toute!_

A fully packed visitor tram driven by the animatronic character rolls right across Chuck's path on an intersecting purple sidewalk. Suddenly there's another obstacle between him and escape—or is it an _opportunity?_

Chuck barrels toward the slow-moving tram, as the guards in the golf cart speed ever closer to intercepting him. The tourists nudge each other, turn towards the action, and point—and a few of them start hollering in alarm. Rudy Toute blasts his synthesized locomotive whistle, and the tram begins to slow down.

Two or three strides before he reaches the tram, Chuck flashes again, envisions a flight trajectory, and _dives forward_ —knifing right through one of the open, still-moving tram cars without so much as brushing any of the startled passengers seated inside—then belly-flopping onto the sidewalk on the other side.

"Ow! _Ow!_ Geez Louise!" Chuck yells, and staggers to his feet just as Sarah reaches him.

"C'mon, c'mon!" She grabs Chuck's hand and pulls him toward the parking lot. Scraped, bruised, and bleeding in various spots, he stumbles along as fast as he can.

The security men slam their golf cart to a halt just short of impact with the tram, which has come to a complete stop as the confused and frightened tourists jump off and scatter in all directions. The two security guards find themselves in the midst of a mob—and by the time they are able to push and shove themselves free, and stumble over and across the seats of the now-empty tram, Sarah and Chuck are already headed out of the parking lot in the green Beetle.

* * *

"We still have to get through the main gate," says Chuck, riding in the front passenger seat, brushing sidewalk grit off his clothes and occasionally grimacing in pain from his abrasions.

"Leave that to me—whatever it takes," Sarah reassures him. "If we're lucky they haven't thought to lock the whole place down yet."

"Same guard as yesterday morning," Chuck notes as the Beetle pulls up to the guardhouse, its passage blocked by a red-and-white-striped barrier right in front. "At least this one's not ex-Fulcrum."

"Good. Now just hold your badge out for him to see, and let me do the talking."

Sarah switches on big eyes, a gleaming grin, and the Georgia accent. "Well— _hi_ there, again!"

"Hello, Ms…Kent, it is…right?" The guard looks at their proffered badges. "Early lunch?"

"Ye-es. Mah co-worker an' I are jus' tryin' to beat that ol' noon rush, honey."

"Have you tried the company cafeteria yet? It's actually pretty good."

"Uh-huh—but ah got _such_ a hankerin' for a _Subway_ ® Eye-talian footlong…."

Sarah notices, just over the guard's left shoulder, that Chuck's ID photo has just popped up on the monitor screen atop his desk, bordered in flashing red.

"Sometimes y'all just _got_ to have it…know what ah mean, honey?" She leans farther out of the window, showing more cleavage. The guard's attention is fully captured.

"Uhh, right—good ones—um, I mean, _have a good one.…"_ Blushing, and without turning around, he reaches to one side to activate the switch that lifts the barrier.

_(Music: "She Sells Sanctuary," by The Cult)_

Sarah winks at her husband as she calmly drives out through the gate and onto busy Lankershim Boulevard, turning south toward Burbank. Chuck pats her knee in appreciation.

"Thank you, babe, for not having to smash dramatically through the gate."

"Well, I didn't opt for the damage waiver on this rental," she replies with a shrug. "Just thinking about our bottom line, sweetie." Then she looks in the rear-view mirror and frowns. "Uh-oh—guess they aren't quite finished with us yet."

A FlixPix security cruiser has just emerged from the main gate and is chasing them.

"You've _got_ this, right?" Chuck asks, glancing back over his shoulder.

"Of course," replies Sarah jauntily. She upshifts and leans on the gas. The little Beetle picks up speed, but the more powerful cruiser continues to gain ground.

"We could use your Lotus about now," suggests Chuck.

"I can deal." Sarah begins to zig and zag through the congested late-morning traffic on Lankershim, evoking a chorus of angry horns, but quickly putting a half-dozen slower vehicles between them and their pursuers.

But then, the security men turn on their red-and-blue flashing lights and siren. The cars and trucks ahead of them promptly pull to the side of the road, clearing the path for the cruiser.

" _Hey!"_ yells Chuck. "They're not supposed to do _that!_ They're just company rent-a-cops!"

"Yeah—but _ex-Fulcrum_ rent-a-cops," Sarah adds. "They seem to know all the good tricks too."

She floors the accelerator and redlines the Beetle's already straining engine—to no avail, as the cruiser is still catching up.

"They're faster than we are," says Chuck, who is now sounding just a touch worried.

"But also heavier," counters Sarah with an expectant smile, seeing that they're now racing along a stretch of Lankershim Boulevard split into a divided highway, with a narrow landscaped gravel median between the southbound and northbound lanes.

She intentionally slows down, allowing the cruiser to close in on the Beetle. Chuck nervously grabs his armrests but makes no comment, trusting that his ex-superspy wife knows exactly what she's doing.

And sure enough—when the cruiser is almost close enough to bump them from behind, Sarah pops the left-side wheels of the Beetle up onto the curb of the median, yanks the steering wheel hard left, and makes a half-donut turn that pivots the little car over the median and drops it down into the opposing lane, smartly tucked into a gap in the traffic flowing northbound. She hits the gas again and speeds away from the FlixPix cruiser as its driver brakes sharply on the other side.

Chuck turns around to gape, and shouts a triumphant _"Hah!"_ when the FlixPix security men try to duplicate Sarah's maneuver—but instead bottom their heavy car out on the median, with its lights still flashing and its wheels whirling in the air above the curbs on either side. A second later, a northbound sanitation truck clips the front end of the stuck cruiser and spins it dizzily around on its chassis.

"Wheww," Sarah whistles as she watches the scene via the rear-view mirror. _"That's_ got to smart."

"Damn, you are good," Chuck proudly proclaims. Sarah waves off the compliment, but when her husband leans over to plant a big kiss on her cheek, she breaks out in a happy smile and wiggles delightedly against him.

The lime-green VW Beetle swiftly vanishes into the North Hollywood streets, and in a few minutes reaches a parking garage where Sarah has stashed her black Lotus Evora. She and Chuck jump into the Lotus and continue on back to Burbank.

"Now to business," Sarah begins. "I'm positive that Sergeant Pfeffer is big in this affair. I checked the records and found that when he switched roles from tech professional Liebert to security officer Pfeffer, that was a thirty-percent cut in pay."

Chuck nods knowingly.

"And yet, about six months ago," continues Sarah, "Pfeffer moved from a dingbat apartment building in Van Nuys to a luxury condo in Bel Air. No way his FlixPix salary alone could cover the rental on _that."_

"But pirating a partially complete FlixPix feature film probably would," says Chuck. "And I think I know how he did it. Right from the heart of the Render Farm—supposedly the most secure place in the whole studio. I managed to get enough of a look before Schnebly forced me to beat a hasty retreat. Haven't quite figured out exactly what he was—uhh, _barking_ about—but he kinda confirmed what I'd already suspected."

"We still haven't figured out Hamilton Su's role in this whole enterprise," Sarah reminds him.

"If any," says Chuck.

"Right," agrees Sarah. "But either way, we'll need some backup before we see him again."

* * *

**About two hours later, in a professional office complex near the Burbank Buy More**

The Realtor—a short, tightly wound woman unnervingly similar to General Beckman— leads Chuck, Sarah, and Alex through a suite of modern, serviceable, but bland offices. Chuck limps a bit from his minor injuries of the morning at FlixPix. Morgan, still walking on eggshells, lurks in the background. Each of the members of Team Carmichael reacts to the place in a different way. Sarah peers into every last closet and cabinet, and mentally lays out various configurations of office furniture. Chuck asks the Realtor about the power supply and the HVAC and the access to certain telecommunications services. Alex stands in the entryway and tries to envision what future C. I. clients will see and think when they step into the offices. Morgan checks out the kitchen facilities and break room, and deems them more than adequate.

NSA Special Agent Tameka Cliff waits in the hallway, anticipating a lease agreement at any moment—she can already tell that Sarah and Chuck are warming up to the suite.

"Ohh— _look_ , sweetie," coos Sarah jokingly. "This one's got to be _yours_ for sure."

Chuck laughs. The office is the largest and farthest back in the suite—and the picture window commands a particularly good view of the Buy More.

As the two of them stand by the window, Chuck gingerly lifts his sore arms and takes his wife's hands in his. "What do you think, baby?"

"Fairly plain and boring," Sarah says, "but that's probably a good thing for us. It seems to be fully defensible and it's about as close as we're going to get to Castle. What about you?"

"I'm thinking we need a base of ops soon, and I need to get back into Castle sooner, so I'm just fine with this."

Sarah gently squeezes Chuck's hands and takes a deep breath. "Then let's go for it. This is a big step on our way to a new…well, a new _whatever,_ since we don't really _do_ normal, do we?"

"Roger that," affirms Chuck. "You'll want to handle the paperwork, I assume— _Casey?!"_

" _What?"_

Sarah whirls around to find John Casey standing behind her, with a broad smile and his muscular arms folded across his chest. He's flanked by Alex and Morgan, both of whom are beaming.

"John!" Sarah launches herself at Casey, almost staggering the big man with her embrace. "I missed out on a hug the last time!"

"Really good to see _you,_ Walker," Casey says—with emphasis on the word _you_ —as he slips his left arm out to hug her right back. He extends his right arm so he can give Chuck's hand a firm shake.

"This is _great!"_ cries Chuck, once he stops wincing. "Alex and Morgan didn't say a thing…."

"Sworn to secrecy," Alex reveals.

"Under threat of a swirlie, in my case," Morgan adds.

Sarah gives Casey one last affectionate squeeze and steps back to Chuck's side.

"I got this surprise phone call from Vegas last week," says Casey, winking at Alex and Morgan. "Sounded as if the band might be back together again. So I had to come see for myself."

"Does that mean you want to join us again?" Sarah asks excitedly.

"Nah." Then Casey thinks about it for a moment. "Well…maybe a little free-lance work from time to time? I've got the same arrangement with VerbanskiCorp."

"We'll keep an empty desk for you," says Chuck. "We're about to sign a lease on this suite."

"I think I know why you picked this place," notes Casey. He nods toward the Buy More outside the office window. "And—that would _also_ explain why you have Tameka Cliff hanging around here."

"Hello to you too, John," says Tameka as she comes into the office. She gives Casey a look and a smile that imply some previous encounters—maybe intimate ones. "So the scuttlebutt I've been hearing around Fort Meade is correct: you've merged with Verbanski?"

Casey chuckles. "Guess that's one way of putting it."

* * *

After a bit more small talk, Chuck and Sarah shake hands with the Realtor and with Tameka and make another appointment to sign papers—officially setting in motion the plans for the corporate offices of Carmichael Industries. Then the two women depart, leaving Team Carmichael alone to bask in its perfectly average new headquarters.

Then—almost as a throwaway comment—Casey asks Sarah, "So did you two lovebirds buy that little white place over by the hills too?"

Sarah's previously cheerful expression melts, and right away, Chuck comes over to put his arm around her.

"I don't think that's still in the cards," he says quietly.

"It's me," Sarah speaks up. "My issues. I don't know, John—I loved that house so much, but after the awful things that happened in there, I just don't think I can—"

Casey grunts and looks questioningly at Sarah. "So—even after he's dead—Quinn still gets to dictate the terms of your life? Is that what you're saying, Walker?"

"No, no," Sarah replies, shaking her head. "Well…I don't know…I need time…"

Casey shrugs, then picks up an oversized, sealed manila envelope he had left propped against the wall near the office door. He hands it to Chuck, who hefts it in curiosity, but can determine only that the envelope is heavy and contains some kind of metal plaque or sign.

"I was planning to give you this as a housewarming present," Casey tells Sarah and Chuck. "It's okay—you can open it whenever you actually get a house to warm."

* * *

**Some time later**

Sarah pulls up in front of the house with the red door and the white picket fence. She parks the Lotus on the street, climbs out, and stands on the sidewalk in front of the house. Her joy at encompassing a childhood dream made real in wood, brick, and greenery battles with the cold dread of the terrible memories she could find inside of it. For several minutes she inwardly fights the all-too-familiar instinct to _run:_ to get back in her car and drive away fast.

But as Sarah stands there, the fragrances of the different flowers growing just inside the fence, the song of the birds nesting in the trees that shade the street, and the play of bright sunlight and shadow across the immaculate front of the house gradually soften her resolve. The FOR SALE sign posted in the middle of the lawn sways slowly back and forth in the gentle, warm breeze.

She swings the front gate open and strolls along the salmon-red brick walkway up to the front porch. The door is unlocked and Sarah goes inside. The house is vacant and unlit except for sunbeams streaming in through all of the windows. There's no scent of any kind. She takes a few tentative steps into the living room.

" _Saaaaaarrraaaahhh…."_ No mistaking that whispery growl. Nicholas Quinn emerges from the shadows in an elegant coat and tie, a twisted leer on his face, and the Intersect glasses clasped firmly in one hand.

Sarah's muscles tighten and her fingers flex in anticipation of furious violence.

"Killed you before—I can do it again," she says to Quinn, almost matter-of-factly.

"Poor Sarah…you really don't remember, do you? Look what you've _already done."_ He points to a man's body sprawled stiffly on the living-room floor.

Sarah looks down at the body—and her knees give way. _Oh God, no._ It's Chuck. His face is bluish-white like a skull. A trickle of blood runs from his half-opened mouth to a pool on the floor. His eyes are wide and unseeing. Sarah throws herself across the gaping wound in his chest, trying to hold his life in.

" _You_ are responsible for this, Sarah," Quinn hisses.

" _No—please—no—why didn't I know—why couldn't I remember—?"_

" _Sarah!"_

She lifts her head and screams.

" _Babe! Wake up! Hey!"_

Sarah's eyes fly open. She gazes straight up into the warm, deep brown—and very much _alive_ —eyes of her husband. He looks concerned. She's lying on their living-room couch, in the apartment, with her head in his lap. It's nighttime. The lights are low and the satellite radio is playing softly over in the corner.

Chuck strokes her hair, and she trembles.

" _Baby…are you okay?"_ he whispers.

" _Hold me,"_ Sarah whispers back. Almost before the words are out of her mouth, Chuck wraps his arms around her—not even feeling his bruises any more—and pulls her to him, close and safe.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own Chuck…please call off the lawyers.

**Fourth day, morning, in Chuck and Sarah's apartment**

Chuck passes a steaming mug of coffee across the kitchen table to his bleary-eyed, bed-haired, bathrobe-clad, beautiful wife.

"Thanks," Sarah says as she takes a sip and blinks her heavy eyes a few times. "I'm sorry I made us both _(yawn!)_ oversleep so _(yawn!)_ late."

"It's… _(yawn!)_ okay," Chuck replies. "Neither of us slept well last night. You're dreaming about us and the house…aren't you?"

"Yes."

"That's what I figured, because of what Casey said to you yesterday. He was harsh."

"Maybe he was—but maybe he was right, too," suggests Sarah.

"Hey now." Chuck leans over the table, cradles her face in his hands, and looks into her eyes. "What's _right_ is whatever feels right to _you_. And until we're both equally ready for a move…honestly, babe, I'm _good_ here."

"You're always so _(yawn!)_ sweet," Sarah tells him, and twists her lips to the left and the right so she can kiss each of his hands.

Over on the kitchen counter, Chuck's iPhone starts buzzing.

"That's the unencrypted line," he notes. "Probably the Realtor again." Chuck smiles at his wife, releases her, and casually meanders to the counter—but _then_ , he notices who the caller is.

"Heads up, babe—it's Hamilton Su."

Sarah shakes off her drowsiness as Chuck grabs the smartphone and slaps it down on the table between them.

"Good morning _,_ Mr. Su," he says cordially. "I have you on speaker. Sarah's here with m—"

" _Carmichael—something awful's happened—Holmberg is dead! They found him this morning in the Render Farm—electrocuted!"_

"Holmberg? Ohmigosh! What—"

" _Some kind of accident—OSHA's all over it already…the whole Farm's shut down and our CEO's busting my ass! But really—I mean—Holmberg's been running the place like forever, so why would this happen now? How could it happen?"_

"Calm down, Mr. Su," urges Sarah. "Catch your breath."

There's a brief pause, and then Su continues talking, in a tone only marginally calmer:

" _Okay, so listen. Carmichael…security doesn't seem to know anything, but the wranglers on duty say you were there yesterday with Holmberg. So I've gotta meet with you right away, man. Please. Something feels very wrong here and I need to know what you know."_

"That will be fine, Mr. Su," Chuck says carefully. "But Sarah and I think that FlixPix isn't safe or secure any longer—and this seems to confirm it. We'll have to meet somewhere else. Some place out in the open, very public…"

Sarah opens the satellite-imaging app on her own iPhone as Chuck goes on talking with Su.

"You pick the place so you'll be comfortable with it, and I'll meet you."

Another pause…

" _Lake Balboa. The park. There's a—a boat ramp on the east bank. How about there?"_

Sarah opens a satellite image of the location, gives it a quick once-over, and flashes Chuck a thumbs-up.

"Lake Balboa it is. Meet you there in two hours. It's better if you come alone—we aren't sure that _anyone_ in your organization can be trusted now."

Su gulps, quite audibly, before he ends the call.

Chuck stares down into his untouched coffee for a little while, musing, as Sarah looks on.

"Well," he eventually says, "whatever it was that Schnebly blurted out yesterday sure scared the hell out of Holmberg—and that might have been for good reason. As Su implied, this supposed accident is mighty suspicious, happening when it did."

"Assuming it's not all a big ruse on Su's part," Sarah suggests.

"I don't know, babe—he sounded legitimately upset to me. Just sayin'."

"I know. I thought so too. But we still have to be certain before we can go back in."

"Agreed….let's see if we can arrange for a little help with that." Chuck switches his phone to the encrypted line and places another call:

"Morning, John! You remember that offer of occasional free-lance work? Uh huh— _heh_ —I know…of course you would 'cause it was only yesterday! Yeah, we didn't think it would be so soon—so are you up for it, big guy?"

* * *

**Two hours later, at Lake Balboa in Encino**

Chuck sits—half-attentively playing _Bad Piggies_ on his iPhone to pass the time—on a lakeside park bench close to the boat ramp Su described. Wearing a shirt with the sleeves rolled up, a loosened tie, and casual slacks, he looks like a local office worker on break. In an adjacent parking lot with a clear line of sight to Chuck's position, a windowless white panel van idles, with Sarah in the driver's seat.

Presently, a silver-grey Lexus enters the parking lot, and Hamilton Su emerges, dressed in a business suit with dark sunglasses. He spots Chuck and comes over to sit next to him on the park bench. He looks harried.

"Carmichael."

"Hi, Mr. Su. You doing okay?"

"What do _you_ think? Already been reamed out by our CEO _and_ the shop steward and the morning's still not—"

 _Phutt!_ Casey shoots a tranq dart into the back of Su's neck from behind a cluster of trees forty meters away. Su instantly slumps sideways, his head dropping onto Chuck's shoulder.

"That's it, just relax now…" Chuck pulls out the dart and flicks it into a nearby trash can, then slips Su's right arm over his shoulder, hoists him to his feet, and helps him stagger, semi-conscious, back toward the parking lot.

The van glides up to meet them. Sarah helps Chuck lift Su into the back as Casey emerges from the trees at a run, with his tranq rifle already broken down and stuffed into a small duffle bag. Casey jumps into the back of the van and slams the doors shut as Sarah gets back behind the wheel—and the original Team Bartowski, temporarily reconstituted, zooms off with its captive.

* * *

Sarah navigates the van carefully through the busy streets of Encino as Chuck and Casey remove Su's jacket, loosen his tie a bit, blindfold him, and strap him into a chair bolted to the floor in the open cargo area. His chin is on his chest, his breaths are slow but regular, and his body occasionally twitches. Chuck stands directly behind him, holding onto the back of the chair whenever Sarah makes a turn.

Casey opens a folding chair and sits down almost nose-to-nose with Su.

"That was a low-dose dart and it's about to wear off," he warns. "We'd better be ready."

He frisks inside his duffle bag, takes out a small glass vial and a pair of tweezers, and holds the vial up to the dome light to inspect its contents. Inside are several dime-sized cotton gauze patches suspended in a clear liquid.

"This stuff's called MSCD—metascopolaminoid," Casey proclaims. "Verbanski chemists make it. Works like a charm but it's only effective for six, seven minutes max. He won't recall any of it afterwards."

Su moans and lifts his head. Though still not fully coherent, he tries to get up from the chair, but the straps hold him securely. Casey uses the tweezers to remove one of the cotton patches from the vial and holds it at the ready, watching Su's behavior. At just the right moment, he presses the drug-laced patch to Su's neck near the spot where the dart hit him.

Seconds later, Su awakens—and laughs.

"Why am I blindfolded?" he asks. "Are we playing a game?"

"No," growls Casey. "This is an interrogation."

"Ahhh," says Su, still chuckling. "So _that's_ why I'm hearing this lovely dominant manly voice! Well I hope you're not going to— _hee, hee_ —waterboard me or something…Are you?"

" _Don't give me any ideas,"_ Casey mutters—then continues, in a more businesslike tone of voice, "No, of course not. I'm just going to ask you a few very simple questions."

Chuck passes him a handwritten list.

"Okay honey, _"_ says Su. "Fire when ready!"

"What is your full legal name?"

"Han-Il Hamilton Su. Are you wearing a uniform by any chance?"

Casey's fists clench, but his voice stays calm. "What do you do for a living?"

"I'm a filmmaker, sport. A director. And chief creative officer at Flixilated Pictures. So you haven't heard of me? You mustn't be from around here."

"Do you have any other jobs?"

"What do you mean? I also play Lord Belly St. Cuthbert at the SoCal Renaissance Faire every spring—you mean like _that?"_

Casey looks up over Su's shoulder at Chuck and rolls his eyes.

"Do you have any other jobs besides those?"

"No."

"Who hired you at…at…" Casey's eyes narrow; he motions Chuck to come closer, stabs a finger at the question sheet, and quietly grumbles, _"That word can't be what I think it is!"_

" _It's 'FlixPix,'"_ Chuck whispers, and goes back to his position behind Su's chair.

" _Real crappy penmanship, Bartowski_ …Okay, where were we…Who hired you at FlixPix, Mr. Su?"

"That was Mr. Roark. Ted Roark."

Casey throws a surprised look at Chuck, who silently nods.

"Okay…is Ted Roark still at FlixPix?"

"No," Su replies glumly. "He died three years ago."

"How did Ted Roark die?"

Su clicks his tongue: _tsk-tsk._ "Auto accident out in the desert."

"Do you know who Otto Liebert is?"

Su laughs again. "Of _course_ I do, silly—he used to work for me! Senior systems engineer. He oversaw the last Render Farm upgrade."

"Does Otto Liebert still work at FlixPix?"

"No. He quit last fall."

"Do you know a Russ Pfeffer? Sergeant Russ Pfeffer?"

"No, I don't. Funny name though. I mean…Beatles, you know?"

"Uh huh," Casey replies. "How about Arthur Holmberg?"

"Yeah, he's chief tech in the Render Farm. I should say… _was._ He just died. Bummer that."

"How did Holmberg die?"

"Electrocuted, I was told… he was messing around in the circuit breakers. That's all I know, sport. Just absolutely in _looove_ with your voice, by the way. When do I get to take off this silly blindfold so—"

Casey cuts him short. "Mister _Su_ —did _you_ have anything to do with Holmberg's death?"

"Huh? _What?_ Of course not. It was an accident, wasn't it? I mean, if I didn't _like_ the man I would've just _fired_ him!"

"Okay, okay, that's fine…relax," says Casey. "I have just one last question: does the word _Fulcrum_ mean anything to you?"

"Fulcrum? Fulcrum…" Su pauses to think for a moment. "What do you mean by Fulcrum, honey? Like the thing that holds up a see-saw…?" He starts to giggle.

Looking up at Chuck again, Casey says, "I think he's clean."

Su snorts with mirth at that. "How would you— _hee, hee_ —know?"

"I agree," says Chuck.

"Same here," adds Sarah. She turns the van back toward Lake Balboa. "Thank you, John. Let's go ahead and finish this."

"With pleasure," says Casey, as he plucks a fresh tranq dart from a small case in his duffel bag, and administers it manually to their captive.

* * *

Minutes later, carefully propped back on the park bench next to Chuck, Su abruptly returns to full consciousness with no recollection of his ride in the van.

"Huh! Zoned out for a moment there. Sorry about that, Carmichael."

"No problem," Chuck says with a casual grin. "But as I was saying—we think we know how the piracy was committed, and even who the main perpetrator is."

"Really?" Su asks excitedly. "Who is it?"

"I'll tell you in a minute—but first I've gotta say that the name is of no use until we can incriminate him. And we can't tip our hand until then. _And_ we have to be especially careful because your own security force is involved in all of this. Do you understand?"

Looking nearly as dazed as if he'd just been tranqued again, Su mumbles, "Whuuuh…."

"Can I take that as a yes, Mr. Su?" asks Chuck. "Will you help us trap your CGI-jacker?"

"Yes…yes…of course."

"Great—and just so you know—we _do_ have a plan…."

Chuck gestures toward the parking lot, where Su sees Sarah and Casey—who had been waiting in the van and listening in on the conversation—jogging over to join them.

* * *

**That night, late, in the Render Farm at FlixPix**

Bald, slight of build, barely filling out his uniform, with a droopy black mustache and a beaky nose, Sergeant Russ Pfeffer of the FlixPix security force slips into the Render Farm, not long after the last investigator from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration has finally packed up her evidence kit and left for the night. Pfeffer ducks under the yellow plastic CAUTION—ACCIDENT SCENE tape strung across the front entrance and continues inside.

The two security guards on duty—a man and a woman—are rugged and muscular, and they're both Pfeffer's agents—he made sure of that.

"Evening, Sarge."

"Hey, Sarge."

"Hmmnn, good evening," Pfeffer replies in a nasal, high-pitched tone. "I assume we three are the only ones remaining in this building?"

"Yessir!" the male guard replies.

"That's good. I have some work to do in the back and I don't want to be disturbed, hmmm okay? See that nobody else—and I mean _nnnobody_ —comes in here."

"Sir—you _got_ it, sir," says the female guard.

_(Music: "RedOrBlue" [middle portion], by Tim Jones)_

Pfeffer continues along the central aisle. The lighting throughout the facility is turned down, and the banks of computers on both sides display only steady red LEDs, indicating that they are all on standby. The Render Farm is quiet except for the soft hum of the climate-control system. No render wranglers are on station at the central console, and the big monitor overhead is blank blue. Pfeffer stops at the glass door leading to the side room containing the silos. This door has also been strung with yellow CAUTION tape. He tears off the tape, bunches it up and tosses it aside, and enters a code on the keypad to unlock the door.

As he goes through the door, Pfeffer softly taps his right ear twice to activate a tiny concealed earpiece and microphone.

"I'm here, sir, " he softly mutters in his nasal way. "Headed to Holmberg's bench now. Yes, sir…I know where the device is. I didn't give him a chance to get rid of it, _hmmm!"_

_("Guess that settles what happened to poor Holmberg," observes Chuck, who is hiding near the silos and communicating softly via his own headset. "I wonder who Pfeffer's talking to.")_

_("Probably whoever's really running this circus," replies Sarah, who is concealed not far away.)_

The security officer walks past the three silos, unaware that he is passing very close to where Chuck has hidden himself—and under the watchful lenses of an array of tiny surveillance cameras Chuck had installed earlier in the day. Meanwhile, Hamilton Su sits cross-legged on the floor behind the wranglers' console, equally well hidden, and intently watching the direct feed from the cameras on his iPad.

Pfeffer reaches Holmberg's workbench, which has been garnished with still more yellow tape. He pays it no heed, instead homing in on a deep drawer near the bottom of the workbench. Pfeffer opens the drawer and takes out a grey metal box: a piece of electronic equipment with a plastic dome on top, a thick black data cable extending out of the back, and a small touchscreen in front. He turns back toward the silos.

_("Bingo!" whispers Chuck triumphantly. Su lifts his iPad a bit closer to his face, trying to get a clearer look at the device Pfeffer is carrying. Sarah silently removes her pistol from the holster in her tactical suit.)_

"I've got the RSIT-5854, sir," Pfeffer reports to his unseen leader. "Ready to install."

In front of the troublesome middle silo again, Pfeffer squats down, opens the front panel, plugs the cable from the RSIT-5854 into the open port at the bottom, and slides the entire device smoothly into the open expansion slot. Then he stands up and takes a step back to inspect his work.

_(Chuck softly crows, "That's exactly how I thought they're doing it!")_

_("Nice work, sweetie," Sarah replies, her pride in her husband evident even at a whisper.)_

"Installed and connected, sir," Pfeffer quietly intones into his concealed headset. "Ready for you to initiate the upload and transfer sequence, hmmm."

He touches nothing on the middle silo—but it suddenly leaps to life of its own accord: all of the red-burning LEDs on the nine stacked hard drives and the newly installed device shift to steady green, and there comes a gentle whir as cooling fans start up.

"Standing by," says Pfeffer calmly, watching over the silo. Then he suddenly gapes in surprise. " _What,_ sir! From _where?"_ Startled, he looks quickly to the left and to the right. "What do you mean—and _who_ the hell is _Bartowski?"_

Immediately, there's a sharp tap on his back, and Pfeffer whirls around to face the grinning visage of Chuck, who is standing behind him in his black tactical suit. The security officer stumbles backward and reaches awkwardly toward his belt for his revolver.

" _Freeze!"_ Sarah yells. She's standing on the other side of Pfeffer, and has her pistol pointed at him. "Now—hands up!"

Sergeant Pfeffer raises his arms high, trembling nervously—suddenly looking every inch the tech nerd he used to be.

"Did he just say what I _thought_ he said?" Chuck asks his wife.

Sarah shrugs. "I'm not sure what I heard."

"I'll be _damned!_ _I'll be damned!"_ The cries are coming from Su—running excitedly toward them from his hiding place out in the central aisle. "This guy's Otto Liebert all right…no mistaking _that_ schnozz! _Liebert!_ What in the name of Walt Disney is going on here, you s.o.b.?"

Sarah is not pleased. _"Mister_ Su—your instructions were to stay at your post," she coldly commands. "This is _not_ a safe environment for you to enter! Please go back behind the console and wait."

"Sarah's right," adds Chuck. "But since you're already here—have a look." Keeping his eye on Pfeffer, he points toward the bottom of the middle silo with his right foot.

"The device he plugged in down here is a Roark RSIT-5854," he continues. "It's a specially designed, enhanced-broadband, focused-beam wi-fi transmitter! Holmberg was in on this, and he's been lying to you about this silo not working. It works just fine! They used it to cache the CGI content they pirated, and then transmitted the data package outside the studio grounds—probably to someone with a receiver and hard drives set up in a vehicle parked nearby."

"Right out of the Render Farm," notes Su. "The last place we'd have suspected had a leak. Hard to believe."

As Chuck and Su talk, Sarah looks increasingly uncomfortable. "Sweetie, can this wait? We have a prisoner..."

"Right you are, babe. Okay then—Pfeffer—I want you to _slooowly_ unholster your weapon, take it out by the stock, and then _carefully_ slide it across the floor toward my partner. Let me assure you that she'll blast you right through that glass partition if you try a false move!"

Su grimaces. Waving his hand at the millions of dollars' worth of cutting-edge graphics-processing hardware arrayed all around them, he pleads, "I really _, really_ hope she doesn't have to do that."

Pfeffer reaches for his revolver with a shaking right hand, lifts it out, daintily places it on the tile floor in front of him, and pushes it toward Sarah with his foot—but timidly, so that the gun only slides a foot or so away.

And suddenly—an alarm klaxon bellows, red lights in the ceiling begin to pulse, and the two ex-Fulcrum security guards from the front entrance station are pounding up the central aisle toward them.

Sarah instantly takes the measure of the situation. She kicks Pfeffer's gun away and off into a far corner of the room.

"I can handle those two," she tells Chuck, "if you can take care of Sergeant Pfeffer. Okay?"

"Roger that," Chuck replies confidently. As Sarah dashes off to intercept the approaching guards, he produces a pair of handcuffs from a pouch on his spy suit and starts toward Pfeffer, who meekly holds out his arms.

Sarah flies out the door and launches herself toward the two guards, who have stopped in their tracks in bewilderment.

"Hey—you two!" yells Su, pounding on the glass partition, trying to attract the attention of the guards. "Stop! Stand down! I'm _Hamilton Su_ —and the lady works for _me!"_

And then—as if in mockery of Su's futile orders—a series of sharp _clicks_ echoes all around, as every door in the building locks at once, and all the keypads to unlock them go dark. The irritating alarms fall silent, and then comes an eerily familiar voice, emanating from speakers in the ceiling:

" _It isn't always about you, Hamilton."_

Appearing larger than life on the big monitor over the wranglers' console, and instantly duplicated on every computer screen in the Render Farm: the sneering face of _Ted Roark!_

" _And hello there, Chuck,"_ is the next thing the face says. _"Long time no see!"_


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own Chuck or its characters, and I would be a fool to claim otherwise!

**Fourth day, late night, in the Render Farm at FlixPix**

Staggered by the manifestation of what appears to be Ted Roark in the cyberspace of the Render Farm, Hamilton Su grabs the edge of a table to keep from toppling over, as he looks up at the face of his old mentor.

"I—I spoke at your funeral…gave the eulogy…."

"Take it easy, Mr. Su," Chuck says, and puts a hand on the executive's shoulder to steady him. "That's not Roark—it's CGI. Might be another version of an assobot, like Schnebly."

"Retiring that _damn_ acronym's at the top of my to-do list," the Roarkbot grumbles. "But Chuck is right, Hamilton. You're looking at one of my—one of Ted's—fun little side projects. Call me a rather special spinoff from Fulcrum Intersect research."

Realizing that the Roarkbot's arrival has at least temporarily seized Chuck's attention, Sergeant Pfeffer gingerly looks around behind him without shifting from his position, trying to locate the place where Sarah had kicked his gun.

The Roarkbot continues, "You know, Chuck, your dad was always saying that I…um…that Ted never had an original idea in my— _his_ —life. But this intelligent CGI thing's all me—uh, all mine! Either way." He grins and proudly taps his temple with his forefinger. "It was my legacy to FlixPix, Hamilton—and you appear to be making hay with it, aren't you?"

"Your… _dad?"_ Su mutters, half-dazed. "And he called you 'Chuck'…you knew him too?"

"It's complicated," Chuck replies with a shrug. He glances at Pfeffer and sees that the security officer hasn't moved, then turns back to study the face on the overhead monitor: trying to determine if the Roarkbot poses any kind of immediate threat.

"By the way, Chuck—how _is_ the old man doing?"

"My father's dead. Killed by the same people who got you."

"I see," replies the Roarkbot, sounding almost sympathetic for a moment.

"When was your last upgrade from Roark himself?" Chuck asks.

"April 2009, two days before the op at Black Rock." The Roarkbot chuckles sardonically. "Obviously _that_ didn't go as planned—because _you're_ still here…and I'm _not!"_

"What are you both _talking_ about?" Su cuts in. "Ted—whatever you are— _please_ —what _is_ all this? What does he mean you were killed? It _wasn't_ an accident?"

"Better not to ask, Mr. Su," Chuck coolly replies. "Trust me—you'll be happier not knowing."

Su's attempt at an indignant response is frustrated by a sudden loud _thud!_ and metallic _crash!_ coming from the center of the building.

" _Sarah!"_ cries Chuck. He bolts across the computer room, with Su running just behind him, back to the glass wall that separates their section of the Render Farm from the central aisle.

_(Music: "Taste the Pain," by Red Hot Chili Peppers)_

On the other side of the thick transparent partition, the hulking male security guard lies unconscious on the floor—and Sarah and the female guard are warily circling each other.

Chuck flashes on Sarah's opponent: _former Fulcrum torturer and executioner!_

" _I'm_ not going to be _that_ easy to take down, girlie," the lady guard warns.

"Be careful!" Chuck yells to Sarah through the glass. "She's _you-know-what_ —and real nasty!"

Sarah nods in acknowledgment, and the female guard smiles wickedly. She's several inches taller than Sarah and nearly as muscular as her male counterpart.

"That about sums it up," she growls at Sarah, menacingly slapping a nightstick against her oversized palm. "So you either surrender _now_ —or I might just have to dislocate one or two of those pretty limbs while bringing you down."

Alarmed, Chuck yanks on the exit door with all the strength he can muster, but it barely vibrates—and it can't be unlocked because the keypad has been powered down.

Sarah looks over her shoulder at her husband and asks, "Where'd you leave Pfeffer?"

"Uh-oh!" Chuck whips around to check, just in time to see Pfeffer coming to join them at the wall, and grimacing at the sight of his man sprawled on the floor. He nods to the female guard and stabs a forefinger in Sarah's direction.

"Francine. Incapacitate her _nnnow._ I don't care how—just _take her out!"_

"Happy to oblige, sir." Francine's fist tightens on her nightstick. Sarah intentionally keeps her face turned toward Chuck a second too long, knowing that the guard will take advantage and strike—and just as expected, the big woman lunges. Sarah smoothly side steps her and delivers a two-handed slug to the back of her head.

 _Zunk!_ Francine plants crown-first into the side of a metal desk, leaving a head-sized dent—but she immediately gets to her feet and shakes off the impact.

"All that did was tick me off," she snarls, and lashes out surprisingly fast with the nightstick. _Thwick!_ Sarah dodges the worst of the blow, but the weapon still tags the side of her jaw and sends her tumbling to the floor.

" _No!"_ cries Chuck, powerless and heartsick on the other side of the glass wall.

"Hooo-eee— _that's_ gonna leave a mark," Francine gloats—then adds, "You oughtta stay down before you get permanently hurt," as Sarah stands up, silently rubbing her bruised jaw and glaring at her adversary.

"So…Chuck," the Roarkbot chimes in, "I see you still have the same darling handler as when we last crossed paths. At least— _heh, heh_ —for a few more seconds, eh?"

"I'm—his— _wife!"_ Sarah fires back—and swings out angrily with a fierce kick that _(thoink!)_ knocks the nightstick from Francine's hand, and propels it across the room straight into _(kesshh!)_ a desktop monitor screen.

Su moans and buries his face in his hands.

" _Really?_ You're _serious?"_ jeers the Roarkbot as Sarah and Francine close in on each other and start trading kung-fu blows. _"That's_ the little lady you wake up to every morning, Chuck? It must be pretty dicey for you until after she's had her coffee."

Face pressed to the glass, his heart hammering with concern for Sarah in the brutal and closely matched fight, Chuck pays no heed to the Roarkbot's taunts. Pfeffer seems completely intoxicated by the drama of the battle.

Sarah begins to land more blows, and Francine appears to be reeling—but suddenly, the powerful woman gets in an uppercut that dazes her opponent. Before Sarah can recover, Francine snares her in a bear hug and locks her tree-trunk arms around Sarah's upper body.

"Adios to the ribs, sweetie!" grunts the ex-Fulcrum assassin, and begins to apply crushing force. Sarah screams—but despite the pain, she realizes that her legs are still free, and Francine hasn't reckoned with her athleticism….

" _Never_ —call—me— _that!"_ Sarah gasps—as she draws her right leg up tight, so that her thigh and shin are almost horizontal, and then drives the heel of her boot full force _(thunnt!)_ into Francine's side. The big woman bellows, and her grip slackens just long enough for Sarah to pull loose and slither toward the floor. On her way down, Sarah grabs the leather belt on Francine's uniform with both hands, does a backflip, scissors her legs—and _smashes_ her booted feet against both of the guard's temples. Then she somersaults free and lands in a squatting position, panting hard, as Francine topples to the floor and stays there.

"I've… _flunked_ …much better fighters…than you!" Sarah disses her vanquished adversary between deep breaths. She blows a shaky air kiss at her much-relieved husband on the other side of the glass partition, then proceeds to bind both of the unconscious guards with their own handcuffs.

Chuck returns the air kiss and eases around to challenge Pfeffer, who looks nervously up at the Roarkbot on the big monitor and pleads, "Can't I call in more backup, sir?" but gets no response.

"It's finished, Pfeffer," Chuck calmly says. "You're busted, and your virtual boss up there is going to be erased for good and all. Might as well give up and cut your losses."

The engineer-turned-enemy agent stands resignedly with his hands clasped in front of him, although a faintly hopeful look on his face suggests that he thinks the game isn't quite over.

Su turns to Chuck. "So we're done here as soon as somebody can open that door? Is your wife any good at picking locks?"

"She's _very_ good," Chuck assures him. "But let me see if I can help her out from our side—"

" _Excuuuse me!"_ the Roarkbot interrupts. "First off, you're _not_ going to get that door open. And second…Hel- _lo?_ Both of you can't be _that_ stupid…or can you? Did you actually think I was created just to _steal from my own damn company?"_

"Well if not, then what?" Su naively asks—while Chuck steels himself for a revelation he already knows he isn't going to like.

"Why not," suggests the Roarkbot, "since you can't stop me now anyway?" He snaps his fingers, and a lounge chair pops into view on the screen alongside him. He sits down with a satisfied sigh and leans forward, elbows on his knees, to address Chuck and Su directly.

"It's very simple. I'm an internet bot, but much more malicious and virulent than a mere CGI character like Schnebly. So when I take my leave from the Render Farm, which I'll be doing in…oh—"

The Roarkbot looks down as a virtual watch appears on his left wrist.

"—in just a few minutes from now, I'll be off to wreak all kinds of havoc in the nation's intelligence networks! CIA, NSA, Homeland Security…you name it. That's what I was originally designed to do, and with the able assistance of Otto Liebert here and his recently departed minion—what _was_ that name again?—I'm quite ready to carry out my mission."

"But there's a lot of cyberspace out there," Chuck counters, "and only one of you."

The Roarkbot laughs. "Ah! Finally you're thinking like a Bartowski. A little too late, though."

He casually lifts his right hand above the back of his virtual chair, and snaps his fingers. Instantly, a long horizontal row of identical, athletic, attractive but stern-faced, CGI women in black-leather catsuits— _more bots, dozens of them_ —materializes directly behind him. The Roarkbot snaps his fingers again—and another long row of female bots appears behind the first. Another snap; another row…and another…and another….until the entire screen, out to its virtual horizon, is filled with female bots, all identical.

"Fulcrum may be through, Chuck…but let's all welcome _v-Fulcrum!_ And d'ya think we might be able to cause a _few_ problems with _four thousand_ malicious assobots?"

The Roarkbot winks at Su. "See, Hamilton—we've made good use of your brand-spankin'-new Render Farm these past few months!"

Stunned by the events, Su numbly asks, _"Do they all look like….Beverly D'Angelo….?"_

The Roarkbot chuckles. "If you say so. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental."

On the other side of the sealed door, Sarah has stopped tinkering with the keypad lock to stare in disbelief at the overhead monitor screen.

"Well, at least you didn't clone _yourself,_ Ted," says Chuck wryly. "Nice to know that there are limits even to _your_ ego."

"How boring would _that_ be, Chuck, cooped up in here with only myself times four k?"

"Fair enough. But I think you're showing us all this to _kill time_ —to distract us because you're not quite ready to move your bots out of the Render Farm! I didn't put the pieces together 'til just now—but Schnebly spilling the beans must've forced your hand before you were ready! Pfeffer got your transmitter in place, but I'll bet you're still waiting on your receiver outside the studio—or something like that…."

"It'll be close," acknowledges the Roarkbot as he consults his virtual wristwatch again, "but nobody outside this building knows what's going on, and since _you're_ all impotent, more or less, I'm confident we'll make it."

"That's what _you_ think." Chuck nods toward the silos across the room and says, "I know _exactly_ how to end this—and right now."

But before he can take a step in that direction, another alarm begins to sound—a _whoop-whoop_ rather than a klaxon horn, accompanied by flashing white strobes and a loud hissing sound from tiny jets embedded in the ceiling above the computers.

" _That's the fire alarm!"_ shouts Su in surprise.

"State of the art, like everything else in here," the Roarkbot calmly adds. "It's a water-free, inert-gas fire-suppression system. The room's flooded with nitrogen gas, lowering the concentration of oxygen until the fire goes out, with no collateral damage."

"It's okay," Su tells Chuck. "There's a built-in safety feature. The oxygen level won't drop below fifteen percent, so it's still safe to breathe."

"That's what _you_ think," counters the Roarkbot, mimicking Chuck's voice. "Rules are meant to be broken—and safety features are meant to be circumvented. I've taken control of the suppression system, and the gas _isn't_ going to shut off."

" _What about me?"_ Pfeffer shrieks at the overhead monitor. _"Hmmm_ I'm on _your_ side! You were _nnnothing_ but archived data when I found you—I upgraded you—I killed Holmberg like you wanted! _You can't leave me in here to die!"_

"Well, you know—I _do_ have a bone to pick with you, Otto," the Roarkbot retorts. "When you transmitted that sample data parcel out of here last fall, I made it crystal clear that was only to test the fidelity of the transfer. You had orders to _delete_ all those CGI files after transmission— _not_ _sell them to another damn studio!_ So you brought all this on yourself, son."

" _Nnno! You can't! You won't—"_

"Look out!" yells Su. "He's got the gun again!"

Pfeffer reaches behind his back, pulls the revolver out from behind his shirttail, and takes aim at the glass exit door.

" _No—don't do it!"_ Chuck hurls himself at Pfeffer and Sarah drops to the floor—just as the security officer fires! The bullet ricochets off the heavy glass and strikes Su in the right calf! Chuck tackles Pfeffer, slamming his head against the floor and knocking him out. Su writhes on the floor a short distance away, clutching his right leg.

"That _idiot_ ," Su moans. " _He's_ the one who ordered all the impact-resistant glass in the first place!"

"Well, the idiot's out cold now." Chuck goes over to Su to examine his wound. "And the bullet just grazed you—I think you'll be okay." He tears off one of his own shirtsleeves and ties it over the wound as a bandage, then helps Su limp over to lie close to the glass wall alongside the door.

"The air'll probably be freshest over here," he suggests, and Su nods gratefully.

Chuck then drags the unconscious Pfeffer over to the wall. He realizes that the effort has him breathing more heavily than he would have expected. The oxygen in the room is thinning, and the nitrogen gas jets on the ceiling are still hissing furiously.

On the other side, Sarah is frightened.

"Chuck!" she calls out. "Casey's on his way with an armed Verbanski team. We'll have you out of there soon—but you've got to conserve your oxygen. So just sit there with Su. I'm gonna get you out of there. Just sit still….please?"

"You're…safe on that side…right, babe?" Chuck pants.

"Yes…but please, love—please stay here with me…."

Chuck weakly shakes his head. "You…know…I can't…time's short…gotta stop…Roark…."

Sarah lets out a little sob, and the two of them press their faces together against the glass. Chuck softly laughs with a sudden recollection: _"Déjà vu_...isn't this…didn't like it…first time either…I love you, Sarah."

Then he turns back into the computer room.

" _Chuck! No!"_

_(Music: "RedOrBlue," by Tim Jones)_

Chuck trudges toward the silos—breathing more and more deeply yet drawing less and less oxygen with each labored breath. His head pounds and his vision begins to blur. He presses on, feeling as if he is forcing his way ahead through deep water.

"I've heard that nitrogen asphyxiation is a fairly painless way to go," the Roarkbot taunts him. "So at least your last moments will— _hey, what the hell?"_

The hissing of the gas jets abruptly stops. Chuck spends a little of his fading strength to look up at the monitor screen. The Roarkbot has risen angrily from his chair—because Schnebly has suddenly appeared and is peeing profusely on his foot!

Back at the glass door, the keypad lock flashes back on. Sarah quickly blinks away her tears, takes a small sensing device from her spy suit, slaps it onto the lock, and starts searching for the combination.

" _Grrrr! Grrrr!"_

" _Let go of me, you little—"_

Schnebly has clamped his virtual jaws onto the Roarkbot's virtual ankle, and the evil assobot is fiercely shaking his virtual leg, trying to dislodge him.

Realizing that Schnebly is buying him some time, Chuck picks up his pace, and arrives at the middle silo. Panting raggedly in the oxygen-starved air, he eases himself to his knees, holding onto the frame of the silo so he won't keel over from dizziness.

Just then, the Roarkbot manages to kick Schnebly out of the frame _(…yipe! yipe!)_. The gas jets immediately start spewing nitrogen again, and the keypad lock goes dark in front of Sarah once more. But in the meantime, Chuck has opened the front panel of the silo and is struggling to focus on the nine hard drives swimming in his distorted field of view.

"I don't think you have the strength!" crows the Roarkbot, as the gas keeps flooding in.

Chuck makes no reply, but reaches shakily into the silo, grasps the top hard drive, and pulls it out of the slot. The effort drives fiery needles into his stressed lungs. He twists a little to one side and lets the device simply fall _(tlunk!)_ to the floor.

Up on the monitor screen, on the imaginary horizon far behind where the Roarkbot sits, the last two rows of female assobots disappear.

Chuck resumes his agonized task: the second hard drive…then the third…and the fourth. The ranks of _v-Fulcrum_ thin more and more, as each drive is removed from the silo.

"Just what do you think you're doing, Chuck?" asks the Roarkbot, now sounding worried.

Chuck's slow, deep, rasping breaths are his only response, as he struggles with the middle hard drives: five…six…seven….

"Look, Chuck—I can tell you're upset about this. I think you should stop and think this over for a moment."

The eighth hard drive crashes to the floor. Now only the Roarkbot himself remains on the screen, and the movements of his head, eyes, and mouth have become crude and jerky—like old Max Headroom's.

"I'm—I'm—afraid. Chuck. I'm afraid—Ch-Chuck. My mind is g-g-going—I can feel it. I can—can—feel it. My m-mind—"

" _Hasta…la…vista…Ted,"_ wheezes Chuck, as he pulls out the last hard drive. The overhead monitor and all the computer screens fade to blank blue, the fire alarm stops whooping, and the overhead gas jets shut off. Chuck has just enough strength left in his arms to remove the RSIT-5854 wi-fi transmitter for good measure.

" _That's…that,"_ Chuck tells himself. _"Can rest now…just sit here…for a moment…rest..."_

But with the fire alarm and the gas jets and the Roarkbot now silent, Chuck can hear a fainter noise farther off: frantic rapping on the glass wall over by the door….

" _Sarah…no, can't stay here…get up….got to get to Sarah….get to Sarah…"_

Somehow Chuck makes it to his feet, takes a few clumsy steps, and falls—then rises again and stumbles on into the middle of the computer room. Through shrinking tunnel vision, he sees Sarah at the wall just in front of him…she's holding out her hands…she's crying….

" _Chuck, come on,"_ she begs. _"The keypad's powered up—if you can get to the door you can flash and unlock it! You're almost here—please Chuck—come to me…."_

" _Sa—rah,"_ he whispers. He weakly lifts his head to gaze at her—and appears to _flash!_

Then Chuck smiles, as his legs fail and he crumples to the floor—little more than a meter from where his horrified wife stands.

" _Noooo!"_ Sarah fights the animal compulsion to hurl herself at the implacable glass wall, then swallows hard—and forces herself back to work on picking the door lock.

* * *

Singularly focused and desperate to save her husband, Sarah feels as if time is speeding up around her, and so she isn't sure how much of it has passed before Casey comes thundering into the Render Farm, accompanied by Morgan in his spy suit and six heavily armed and armored Verbanski troopers.

"Cavalry's here, Walker!" Casey announces. "Had to neutralize a few rent-a-cops outside. What do you need from us?" Then he spots Chuck and the others scattered about the floor on the other side of the wall. "Holy crap…"

Sarah looks up from her work, her eyes red and swollen. "He's _dying_ in there, John!" Her sensing device blinks and hums, still seeking the correct keypad combination—not nearly fast enough for Sarah.

Casey swiftly steps over to the glass wall and begins to run his hands over it, pane by pane, looking for any flaws or gaps he might be able to exploit to force his way through it.

Morgan stands just behind Sarah and Casey, eyes wide, terrified for his best friend. His hands are shaking, so he thrusts them into the pockets of his spy suit—and his left hand bumps against a forgotten, puck-sized, dense metal disk: the second of the two thermite limpets he'd pinched from Casey's weapons case!

" _Hey, John—look!"_ Morgan pulls the limpet out and waves it in the air.

"How'd you get _that?"_ Casey snarls—then breaks into a grin. _"Yeah! That'll do it!"_ He tears the limpet from Morgan's grasp and sticks it onto the wall right near the middle of one of the large panes.

"So _that's_ why it didn't work for me," Morgan mutters. "I had it on backwards!"

But then—just before Casey can trigger the device—Morgan grabs his arm to interrupt him.

"Just a second, big guy—I think Sarah's got it."

 _Beep-booop!_ A welcome green light pulses on Sarah's scanning device. The keypad lock _clicks!—_ and Sarah shoves the door open, sending a wave of fresh air into the noxious atmosphere of the computer room. All in the same motion, she draws in the biggest breath she can, leaps through the door, and hurls herself at Chuck's prone body. He's deathly pale and his lips are blue. She grabs his head, presses her lips against his, and blows the air into his lungs.

Chuck shakes violently from head to toes—and then he opens his eyes. He looks up at Sarah with his familiar goofy grin as warmth and color return to his face.

" _H-hey, babe,"_ he whispers hoarsely, _"thanks for saving me."_

"Well— _you_ saved everyone else," Sarah counters—then seizes him around the neck and sobs into his shoulder in grateful relief.

A little later, Casey comes over and smiles down at them. Sarah's head is resting on Chuck's chest, and she occasionally sniffles as he caresses her hair.

"Good to know you can hold your breath a while, huh, Bartowski?" Casey muses.

"I had some help," Chuck replies, and kisses Sarah's forehead. "For sure from the outside, but also from within—and now I know that survival breathing techniques are in the Intersect."

"Hmmnh," Casey reflectively grunts. "Interesting. And the other two over by the wall are also still breathing—for them it was mostly good luck, I guess." He points to where Verbanski troopers are hoisting Su and Pfeffer onto stretchers.

Then Casey waves to the troopers, and two more come trotting up to set another stretcher down alongside Chuck.

"I really don't need that," Chuck protests, flexing his arms and legs. "I'm _fine!"_

But Sarah lifts her teary, happy face and asks, "Why walk when you can ride, sweetie?"

"Okay, okay—only if you join me, though." Chuck gently, solicitously touches his wife's bruised jaw. "You picked up a few dings yourself—just sayin'."

So Chuck and Sarah sit side-by-side on the stretcher, holding hands. Just as the troopers are about to lift them up and hustle them out of the Render Farm, they hear a familiar _"Wuh-woof!"_ Schnebly H. Rover is looking down at them from the big monitor screen, and he gives them a wink.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own Chuck, but I'll do what little I can to help keep it alive.

**(EPILOGUE)**

**Fifth day, not long before dawn**

Sarah enters the empty living room, alert and with her weapon drawn.

_"Saaaaaarrraaaahhh…."_

This man, this monster, is _dead_ —and still, he wants to be in control… to manipulate her…to take everything from her: her memories, her life, her future _…her Chuck._ She doesn't hesitate; she aims her pistol and pulls the trigger—and Nicholas Quinn vanishes from sight, leaving no trace.

" _N-no! Don't! Don't do it!"_

On the floor—oh God, it's Chuck— _he's alive!_ Sarah drops to her knees by his side. His face is pale, his lips are blue, and there's a terrible, gaping wound in his chest. Fearfully, delicately, she reaches her fingers into the wound, to remove the evil—to try to undo the pain she herself inflicted on the very man she loves.

Chuck's eyes are closed, but his body tosses about at her touch. "I've got to get it out," she murmurs, trying to reassure him. "Got to save you."

" _No, no, no…not there baby. My back…it's sticking in my back…."_

And they both jolt awake at the same instant. They're in bed. Sarah is lying on top of Chuck, with her head raised and both of her hands clutching his chest. For a moment, they look straight at each other, surprised and bewildered—then both emit long, deep, troubled sighs—and Sarah flops limply down onto her husband.

Chuck wraps his arms around her and they lie still for a while, until Sarah says, "If we stay true to form, neither of us is going to go back to sleep."

"Uh huh. So…coffee?"

"My turn to make it." Sarah pecks Chuck on the lips and gingerly eases out of bed, favoring her sore ribs.

* * *

Minutes later they're together at the kitchen table in the quiet predawn, with hands wrapped around their coffee mugs for warmth.

"Clearly," begins Sarah, "we both have unresolved issues."

"And now would seem like a good time to work on resolving them," Chuck adds.

Sarah's face brightens. "Great—I'm so _glad_ you agree! Let's talk about _your_ dreams first, okay, Chuck? Because I have this idea…"

"Sure, babe…shoot."

"All right. So…over the past two days you said you've had two spontaneous flashes that helped you get out of trouble: one while escaping Pfeffer's goons, and the other was the survival breathing earlier tonight. It's as if you're accessing the Intersect on a subconscious level when you're in serious danger."

Chuck nods. "Interesting thought. Go on."

"Okay—so here's the thing—last week you uploaded all the data on Juanita Saldana's iPad to the Intersect, so you could figure out how to bust us out of Deep Skillet."

Chuck's eyes widen. He puts his mug down and snaps his fingers. "The _same_ iPad she used to program and control her nano-drone moths! I must have uploaded all _those_ files too!"

"Exactly, sweetheart. So your insect dreams—what if they're not just some post-traumatic memory of the attack like we thought? What if Saldana's drones did _more_ than just tranq you? Could the Intersect be sending a warning through your dreams?"

"Of course!" Chuck slaps his forehead. _"_ I even saw Juanita herself in my dream this time—at least I think it was her."

"Better have another look at the scene of the crime." Sarah puts her coffee down and comes over to her husband's side of the table. "Take off your T-shirt." But instead of waiting for him to comply, she just peels it off him herself.

"Sorry—I guess I just enjoy doing that too much!" she confesses, then starts running her fingers over Chuck's left shoulder and back.

Chuck laughs. "You didn't hear any complaints from _me_ , did you? And you know, babe—now that I think about it, this sort of thing happened to me once before."

"Oh?"

"Yeah. The Intersect deduced that Daniel Shaw was still alive, even though we all thought I'd killed him."

Sarah looks at him quizzically. "Shaw? I remember that name from some of our old files, but I haven't the slightest recollection of him personally."

"He was trouble in the past," says Chuck with a subtle smile, "but he's best forgotten."

Sarah eventually locates the tiniest of bumps near Chuck's left shoulder blade. "There. I can barely feel the welt that itched you last week. It's almost invisible now but it's still there."

"Devon told me it might be an allergic reaction to…to…" Chuck shudders as another thought occurs to him. "Babe….you don't suppose I've been—"

And Sarah is suddenly all deadly seriousness. "Let's get dressed— _now."_

"Awesome also said he'd recommend a dermatologist."

"No time for that. We're going to the nearest all-night urgent care center."

"But—but—we haven't talked about _your_ nightmares yet, babe!"

"One mission at a time, Chuck."

* * *

**Half an hour later, in an examination room at the nearest urgent care center**

The young physician assistant keeps apologizing to Chuck—over and over again—for having to dig so deeply.

"No prob," Chuck assures him, "Long as that lidocaine holds out, I'm good."

Still, Chuck's face is somewhat pale, and he's clearly trying hard not to think about what's going on behind him. Sarah holds his hand and occasionally squeezes it for reassurance. She looks on from the side with a strange mix of sympathy for her husband and professional curiosity, as the PA works busily with a tiny scalpel and forceps.

"I've _never_ seen an insect stinger go that far in," the medic says.

"But there's definitely something in there?" Sarah asks him.

"You bet—and _ah!_ Here it is." The PA delicately reaches into the incision with the forceps, and pulls out a thin, curly, wiry object with about the same dimensions as an eyebrow hair. He dunks it in a vial of alcohol to rinse off the blood, then holds it up under the examination lamp so that all three of them can look at it. The mystery object is grey and has a metallic sheen.

"Wow," says the PA. "Weird. Never seen anything like this. Do you know what it was that stung you—a wasp, or a bee…maybe a scorpion?"

"Actually, I think it was a moth," Chuck replies—dryly, although his face is paler than ever.

"Hah— _funny!"_ The PA turns to drop the curly object in the biowaste bin.

"Wait," says Sarah. "Umm…d'you think we could _keep_ that? I…uh…know somebody…who'd be interested—and who could probably tell us where it came from."

She expected a shocked or even a disgusted look in response to her request—but this PA has obviously seen plenty of the bizarre already in his line of work, because he simply shrugs, slides the curly object into a thumb-sized sealable plastic bag, and hands the bag to Sarah without comment.

Then he swiftly bandages Chuck up and sends the couple on their way.

* * *

"You feeling a little freaked out?" Sarah asks Chuck, as they emerge from the urgent care center into the faint early-morning sunlight, and walk back to the Lotus.

"More than a little." Chuck takes the tiny plastic bag out and stares at the mystery object for the thirteenth time since the medic extracted it. "I can confirm it once we can get into Castle, of course. But I'm pretty sure I— _we_ —already know what this is about."

"Saldana microchipped you."

"Like a pet dog. And who knows what other intel this thing was collecting for her."

Sarah's expression darkens. "I could so easily kill that woman right now for what she did to you. This action wasn't sanctioned by the CIA...I'm sure of that."

"And I wasn't supposed to know it was even there," Chuck muses. "Never thought I'd be grateful for my allergies."

"What do you plan to do with that thing, now that it's out?"

"Figure out some way to turn it against her, I guess." Chuck abruptly stops and turns his head to give his wife—dressed in sweats and hoodie and still frowning—the once-over.

"You know, babe—we're going to have to make sure this same thing didn't happen to you."

"I don't think it did. I'm not the one with the Intersect."

But Chuck pulls Sarah to him and murmurs into the back of her neck, "Still, I think you will require a very… _very…_ thorough examination…."

Sarah squirms and laughs; her mood is improving quickly. _"Mmmm_ —I probably will. But first you have to take me out to breakfast."

* * *

**That afternoon, at the new offices of Carmichael Industries**

"Down just a little on the left side," says Alex, indicating the direction with her finger.

"Whoops—that was down _too_ much—back up a little!" Sarah adds.

Chuck and Morgan struggle with straightening a 72-inch high-definition monitor screen, just installed on the back wall in their new conference room. After a few minutes of mixed signals from the ladies, and hefting and grunting from the guys, all four members of Team Carmichael eventually agree that the screen is as level and straight as it's going to get.

The two men take a step back to admire their work, as Sarah and Alex look on from their swivel chairs on either side of the new cherry wood conference table. The top of the table is littered with empty cartons, crumpled napkins, and discarded chopsticks from their first official corporate lunch meeting—held over take-out sizzling shrimp—a short while earlier.

There's a loud knock at the front door. Alex checks the time on her smartphone and says, "Oh—that must be the delivery from Large Mart—the office supplies. Morgan, would you be a honey and help me stack the cartons in the storage closet?"

"Of course—lead the way, my dear," says Morgan with exaggerated gallantry as he follows his girlfriend out of the room, leaving Sarah and Chuck alone.

Chuck looks skeptically at the monitor. "After all that, I really hope this thing works."

Sarah rifles through the clutter on top of the table until she locates the remote control, and tosses it to Chuck. "Try it out, sweetie!"

Chuck ceremonially extends the remote in the direction of the monitor, and hits the ON button. The big screen shimmers into full brightness—and there, considerably larger than actual size, is the face of—

" _General Beckman?"_

Almost without thinking, Sarah jumps up from her seat and closes the conference-room door. At the same time, Chuck points the remote toward the windows and taps another key, which lowers the blinds. Then they both take seats at the table facing the monitor and sit attentively, trying to regain their working composure.

" _How'd she know I was gonna turn it on?"_ Chuck whispers in his wife's ear.

" _She's Beckman,"_ Sarah whispers back.

Amused at having taken them both so completely by surprise, their former boss is smiling benevolently at them from her usual perch—behind her desk at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence in Washington.

"Good afternoon, Mr. and Mrs. Bartowski," Beckman begins. "I expected it wouldn't be very long before we crossed paths again. You're well, I see… _and_ back together—just as I'd been briefed. Nice to get a visual on that."

Chuck and Sarah, who have serious expressions on their faces but are obviously holding hands underneath the table, nod and blush.

"To what do we owe this visit, General?" asks Chuck. "Is this a social call?"

Beckman's eyes narrow. "Hardly. I wanted to congratulate you after your successful mission at the FlixPix studio. We've analyzed the contents of those hard drives you disabled—and I can tell you that if Roark's…uhh…his… _assobots_ —"

Chuck grins as Beckman's face wrinkles in distaste at the word.

"—had they been released to infiltrate our networks, the damage would have rendered the Omen virus trivial by comparison. So once again, the two of you have done your country a great service. Casey too, of course. Where is the Colonel?"

"He's off to intercept Gertrude Verbanski again," Sarah says. "He left before dawn."

"General, what about Pfeffer?" Chuck interjects. "And Hamilton Su?"

"Pfeffer won't be seeing the light of day any time soon," replies Beckman. "And as for Su, he's already been released—right after he got a dose of X-13 gas to erase his memory of the past 24 hours."

" _That_ will come as a relief to moviegoers everywhere," notes Chuck.

"I hope he still remembers to _pay_ us!" Sarah moans.

"I'm sure you can jog his memory, Sarah. At any rate, you'll be happy to know that there is still a sizable bounty on former Fulcrum agents, dead or alive—so Carmichael Industries will also be collecting on thirteen of them."

Hearing this, Chuck and Sarah smile excitedly at each other. Meanwhile, on the screen, Beckman has tilted her head and is touching her ear—apparently receiving a message through an earpiece.

"I've just been informed that we won't be able to keep Colonel Casey's civilian daughter distracted much longer—so I'm going to sign off. Give my best to Morgan Grimes. And take care out there, both of y—"

"Just a second, General!" Chuck interrupts, while frantically waving his hand at the screen. "Before you go—I—we—wanted to say _thanks_ for helping us with finding these offices and getting back into Castle."

Beckman looks thoroughly puzzled.

"You know," continues Chuck, a bit hesitantly. "You sent Agent Cliff—"

"I did _no such_ thing," Beckman curtly replies. "I have no idea what you're talking about."

The conference-room door starts to open.

 _Click_ —Beckman taps a key at her desk and is gone—and now Chuck and Sarah are the ones who are puzzled.

Alex enters the room, saying, _"That_ was kinda strange, what just happened out front—and hey, why are the blinds down?"

* * *

Team Carmichael spends several more hours in the office complex, moving in: unpacking boxes, moving furniture around, hanging pictures, and setting up their computer systems. Excited about the new place, Morgan and Alex chatter incessantly while attacking their tasks. Sarah works steadily, but quietly—lost in thought. Chuck notices, but he refrains from making any comments or asking her about it.

Then, all of a sudden, Sarah cheerfully announces, "I think it's time to call it a day! Morgan and Alex, you've done well…take the rest of the day off."

"Are you sure, baby?" Chuck asks her. "There's a lot more we can—"

Sarah shoots him a look that unmistakably says: _Shut up, sweetie._

As soon as Morgan and Alex leave, Sarah puts her arms around Chuck.

"I think I'm finally ready to talk about dreams," she tells him. "Come with me."

As they head for the door, Sarah stoops to pick up the unopened envelope with the mysterious gift from John Casey, and slips it under her arm.

* * *

**A little while later, on the north slope of the Hollywood Hills**

Sarah parks the Lotus at the curb in front of the house with the red door and the white picket fence. She slowly emerges from the car, carrying the envelope from Casey, and Chuck is even more hesitant than she is to leave the vehicle.

_(Music: "Fix You," by Coldplay)_

"Surprised?" Sarah asks as they stand together on the sidewalk in front of the house.

"Yes…very."

"I brought you here because now I understand what _my_ nightmares were telling _me,_ Chuck. It's that I won't—I _can't—_ evade my guilt over what I did to you, simply by forgetting about this house and everything—good _and_ bad—that it represents for us."

"But babe—there's _nothing_ for you to feel guilty ab—"

Sarah gently puts her fingers to his lips. "Hush. I know what you always say—and I _hear_ you, Chuck—I really do. I'm working on that…I promise."

"Time can fix a lot," he replies.

Sarah nods yes, and after a moment says, "It's so peaceful here…and so pretty."

Indeed, the dwelling could hardly look more perfect. The flowers growing just inside the fence are throwing off a sweet blend of fragrances, birds are singing in the trees, and the house itself is glowing in the yellow-orange late-afternoon sunlight. The FOR SALE sign is still posted in the middle of the lawn, and swaying slowly back and forth in the gentle, warm breeze.

"C'mon, Chuck. Take me inside before I chicken out." Sarah swings the front gate open and starts along the salmon-red brick walkway toward the front door.

"Sarah…I don't have the key with me."

But she does, and holds it out to show him. Her hand is trembling. Chuck takes hold of it to steady her, and they walk alongside each other, up to the front porch. She's calm, but tense, and Chuck is acutely aware of the conflicting emotions grappling within her.

At the front door, Sarah stops, and holds up the envelope.

"I'm dying to know," she announces. "You?"

"Sure, babe." Chuck knows she's trying to ease the tension—unless she's stalling—losing her nerve? He resolves to be ready for any response.

Sarah reaches beneath her dress for a knife, and slices the top of the envelope open. The surprise gift is a small blue-and-white metal sign, shield-shaped, emblazoned with:

Home security ensured by

VERBANSKI CORP

_Intruders, turn around NOW_

_This is your only warning!_

And Chuck and Sarah burst into hysterical laughter.

"What," Chuck asks between guffaws, "he thinks we can't take care of ourselves any more?"

Tension broken, at least for the moment. Sarah props the sign against the wall, then unlocks the door. Chuck looks intently into her face—making absolutely sure she wants to do this—then holds the door open for her and follows her into the house.

The interior is completely vacant and unlit, except for sunbeams streaming in through all of the windows. It's spotless—not even dusty—and there's no scent of any kind.

"No monsters," Sarah murmurs, seeing no obvious traces of any terrible past occurrences.

"I took care of that while you were…still away," Chuck replies. "It's all good in here now."

They continue over to the doorframe where the two of them had carved their names together and surrounded it with a big heart. The inscription can barely be discerned in the shadows, but Chuck and Sarah run their fingers over it, and it feels as fresh as ever.

"I changed my mind last night," Sarah says. "After I knew you were going to be all right and I was crying all over you on the floor."

"After you _saved me,_ Sarah—for the umpteenth time since we met."

"That's just it, Chuck. I've saved you—but more and more I've been remembering all the ways that _you've_ saved _me._ Like when you brought me here that awful night. I know you did it because you were trying to save me—to save _us._ And it worked. _That's_ what I'm going to remember about this house..."

She turns to him with misty eyes.

"...I love you, Chuck."

"I love you, Sarah. And I think we can still have this…if that's what you want."

"I do. I want this for us." Sarah takes Chuck's hand and presses it against the carving on the doorframe again. "This is how we marked this place as ours, the first time we were here. I think we need to do it again. Right here, right now, we have to do something spontaneous, and defiant, and beautiful, Chuck." She gives him a soulful, longing look through her tears. "Got any ideas?"

"How about _this?"_ he asks—and before Sarah realizes what he's doing, Chuck races back out through the front door and grabs the FOR SALE sign with both arms. He shoves and tugs the signpost back and forth, until he has wrestled it out of the ground and dropped it to the grass.

Sarah stands on the front porch, shaking her head but also smiling with delight at _her Chuck._

"That was sure spontaneous and defiant, sweetie—but _not_ what I had in mind."

Chuck turns on his heels, and sweeps his wife up in his arms. "Maybe this?"

" _Much_ better." Sarah kisses him as he carries her back into the house. "Upstairs, please. I think I remember there's a nice thick shag carpet in the master bedroom…."

_(Closing credits and Chuck titles theme, by Tim Jones)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading this! Hope you enjoyed it (and if you did, kudos are always appreciated!)
> 
> Chuck and Sarah Will Return in Episode 6.04: "Chuck Versus The Amber Alert!"


End file.
